The After-Salone 2013: Hand Games

May, 6 2013 • 10:00

Posted inInner Style

“Con le mani tu puoi dire di si” (With your hands you can say yes), used to sing Zucchero in 1987. Some people have used their hands to build a business, while others have dedicated an entire century, and business, to the use of hands.

 

 

From Olivari 2012 catalogue - Author: Alessandro Di Giugno

 

 

 

At the Salone Internazionale del Mobile in Milan 2013, I had the pleasure of visiting one of the most beautiful stands of the year, the Olivari stand. The company, for more than 100 years, creates handles and accessories for doors and windows that are among the most important in the industrial scene and world of design. This year they have decided to take design “by the hands”.

 

 

Image from novaratoday.it

 

 

 

The entire collection was displayed as if the handles were pieces of jewellery, in a cheerful spring creative factory, a surreal reality halfway between a dream and imagination. Although the theme was unquestionably based on cartoons, I did not expect to find Mickey and Pluto playing with a tennis ball, but Robin Williams as Leslie Zevo in the movie Toys explaining how the stand was not a fantasy seeking to represent reality, but reality wanting to transmit a dream, a profound message that only hands can communicate. 

 

 

Toys - Giocattoli (copyright Twentieth Century Fox) licence EDP 

 

 

 

Large hands were spread around the stand, holding the newly designed handles by famous Italian and international designers.

 

 

From Olivari catalogue 2012 - autore_Alessandro Di Giugno

 

 

 

I walked through the diverse ergonomic handle-shapes, each with its own personality and message. Shapes and materials came together in almost endless combinations as a ‘jewel’ that you touch every day, how nice it would be to be able to draw for them!

 

 

From Olivari catalogue 2012 - autore_Alessandro Di Giugno

 

 

 

Salone Internazionale del Mobile, stand Olivari curated by Studio Calvi & Brambilla, Milano.