Particular Materials: Victoria Regia

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Victoria Regia is a natural quartzite from Brazil, specifically from the state of Espírito Santo.

It owes its name to a wonder of nature, the Victoria Regia, a huge aquatic plant with large round leaves floating in the waters of the Amazon.

Indeed, the large cloudy shapes on shades of green in the slab are reminiscent of this plant.

Victoria Regia is resistant to corrosive substances, making it an ideal material for kitchen countertops and other machined items such as bathroom tops, sinks, and shower trays.

The dynamic design of this material makes Victoria Regia ideal for indoor floor and wall coverings.

Vitoria Regia quartzite definitely expresses its potential best with polishing, although we feel we can also recommend it with a satin surface.

 

Special Materials: Kalliston Marble

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Kalliston marble (from the Greek “kallistos,” meaning “beautiful”), is an elegant and precious type of white marble, characterized by a particularly snow-white color, with fine grain and gray veins: it is the softest and whitest variety of precious stone that can be found.
In appearance, it resembles white clouds floating lightly in the sky: impossible not to pause and admire its charm and beauty.

The charm of Kalliston marble can be accentuated by the type of finish that is applied to the material, enhancing the quality and naturalness of the stone.

Careful and skillful processing, in addition to improving the aesthetic appearance of the marble slab, acts on the physical characteristics of the material, making it, for example, less slippery for uses in wet areas (spas, pool edges, etc.) or more resistant to weathering and pollution.

Some types of finish make the stone more polished, smooth to the touch, while others give the material a rough texture, giving it a unique appearance.

 

The most commonly used finishes for Kalliston marble are polishing and brushing:

 

Polishing

This type of finish is used to make the surface of the marble perfectly smooth, mirror-like. The resulting shine brings out the details and beauty of the material. In addition, closing the pores of the stone provides better surface protection. Polishing is suitable for interior use.

Brushing

With brushing, the effect achieved is an ‘orange peel’, worn appearance that is smooth and pleasant to the touch.
This finish is applied to give the surface of the slab an aged appearance, making it very suitable for use as a kitchen floor or top.

 

Its uses

Kalliston white marble is very popular and appreciated because of its luxurious beauty, suitable for completing a design with a unique, modern, yet simple touch.

The main uses of Kalliston white marble are: artistic elements, flooring, wall facades, decorative functions, bathrooms, kitchens, furniture accessories, sculptures, ornaments and interior wall coverings.

Particular Materials: the Alabaster of Volterra

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The Tuscan town of Volterra, has always been considered a landmark for the mining and working of alabaster: a delicate, lustrous and elegant material with which to create artistic and handcrafted works of the finest workmanship.

Volterra’s alabaster is recognized as the finest in Europe!

Each Volterra quarry generates a different type of alabaster based on the chemical composition of the soil: consequently, varieties less rich in inclusions are white and transparent, while inclusions of clay and metal oxides produce alabasters that tend to be gray with veins.
Amber, yellow and reddish colorations are due to metal oxides and hydroxides.

Volterra alabaster is a material with a translucent finish, and its uses are many, with decorative and interior design-related uses standing out.

For example, one can exploit its transparent surfaces to create plays of light and shadow in any environment from the kitchen to the bathroom via the living, home working and bedroom.

 

Contact us to learn more!

 

Special materials: Quartzite Fusion Wow

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Fusion Wow is a quartzite from Brazil that is characterised by a combination of colours capable of creating an effect of considerable visual impact, original and exclusive.

This quartzite is a great addition to any interior or exterior design, and the most commonly used finishes are polished and brushed.

 

There are different types of this particular quartzite from Brazil, including:

 

-Fusion Wow Dark: a material that seems to have absorbed the colours of the depths of the oceans, able to fascinate with its mottled blue;

 

-Fusion Wow Light: a material in refined shades of green with cream, white, gold and black tones that spread like gentle waves in the wind;

 

-Fusion Wow Multicolour: recalls the many warm tones of nature, with an explosion of predominantly reddish and dark grey colours tending towards blue;

 

-Fusion Wow Green: is characterised by a mixture of colour waves – white, cream, gold, ocean green and black. This quartzite expresses itself in a strong way, enhancing any project by giving interior and exterior spaces greater visual interest.

BLOCK

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We are excited to present you the project of Leonardo Novolissi and Andre Di Cristo, with whom we collaborated to create BLOCK: a charging stand for smartphones. Leonardo and Andre are students of Professor Sabrina Sguanci’s course at ISIA in Florence.

What is BLOCK?

BLOCK is basically a charging stand for the phone, but with respect to the basic morphology of this product, it eliminates the primary function of the smartphone, limiting the display of the screen to a small vertical window; moreover, it has been designed so as not to allow the phone to be used from the moment it is turned on.

It is also designed not to allow the phone to be used from the moment it is put on charge, effectively putting a block between the user and the device.

Obviously, if they had stopped here, this project would have seemed more like a provocation, without any real commercial value; this is why they have added an application to it, through which the user can both see his or her progress thanks to an interface showing the time gained by not using the smartphone, and also receive small prizes in the form of discount vouchers for various events: bike or scooter rentals for city commuting, gyms, yoga, restaurants, etc… .

Materials used:

Carrara marble

Carrara marble is an atavistic material, linked to a long artistic and artisan tradition. For this reason, using it in a project with modern connotations creates an interesting contrast, fuelled even more by a digital production. It also fits well with the project’s underlying concepts, thanks to its translucence and colour, which recall the inspirational source of ice but also the monolithic one.

Want to find out more about the marble? Click here

Brass

Brass is the contrast that allows us to use marble, without transforming

our object into something too “ancient”, also made by digital

through digital manufacturing processes. The marble part is obtained from blocks of marble sectioned with respect to a cutting plane that identifies the size of the object; once this extrusion is obtained, the marble is excavated with a CNC equipped with water cooling, so as not to cause any damage.

Once this extrusion is obtained, the marble is carved with a CNC equipped with water cooling, so as not to overheat the stone surface.

Processing

From a production point of view, the workings designed for the object are mainly based on digital manufacturing processes.

The marble part is obtained from blocks of marble cut in relation to a cutting plane that identifies the size of the object; once this extrusion is obtained, the marble is carved with a CNC machine equipped with water cooling, so as not to overheat the stone surface.

CNC machining involves two phases: a first phase of sketching out the shapes and a second phase of finishing. The two phases differ in the type of head used.

The metal part, on the other hand, is produced through sintering moulding: the brass powder, heated by a laser, is soldered together, giving life to our object. An operator will then polish the object, making the layering left by the moulding method invisible.

Botticino Marble

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There are several varieties of botticino marble, each type has design nuances that make it more or less suitable for various uses:

 

Botticino Marble Classic

The Classico variety lends itself to polishing and creates an excellent impact from the ”monumental” point of view, with its ability to give an evocative coloring to interior spaces. This type of marble is most suitable for coatings, floors, kitchens, stairs, bathrooms, slabs and rooms of all kinds.

Botticino Marble Classic

Marble Botticino Semiclassico

Semiclassico is a variety that stands out for its fine-grained beige-colored background, with the intrusion of brown veins, perfect for realizations with a traditional character.

This variant can be used for both interior and exterior cladding, as well as for slabs and floors of all kinds.

 

The finishes can be: polished, polished, hammered, rolled, striped, bush-hammered, sandblasted and brushed.

The market for this variety of marble faces fierce competition, where we find material called botticino a beige marble of another origin, extracted and processed at low cost.

Marble Botticino Semiclassico

Botticino Fiorito Marble

Fiorito is a light beige variety that stands out for its peculiar white cloudiness. These particular colorations make botticino fiorito particularly suitable for prestigious works such as interior coverings and floors.

Finishes can be: brushed, sanded, polished, honed, scored, rolled, bush-hammered and hammered.

Suitable for: floors, coatings, bathroom tops, kitchens, thresholds, stairs, worked, slabs.

 

Botticino Fiorito Marble

Laminam

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Laminam is a slab of porcelain stoneware (which is part of the family of ceramics), obtained by specific industrial processes and used in particular to cover flat or vertical surfaces, such as walls, tables, kitchen or bathroom tops, etc..

It is a material of the latest generation that is very much appreciated in the furnishing sector, especially for its chemical and physical properties that make it extremely resistant to heat, frost, scratches, possible corrosive phenomena or mechanical stress and the countless variations of colors and textures available. Some colors can faithfully reproduce the appearance of specific natural materials (such as marble or travertine), but also “industrial” shades (such as iron, lead and oxidized plutonium) that recall traditional processing techniques.

Laminam ceramic surfaces represent the maximum evolution of porcelain stoneware, being thin and ultra-resistant.
The large format slabs, 1620 x 3240 mm, with a thickness of 12 mm, are specifically created to create tops and doors for kitchens and bathrooms, as well as floors and walls for interiors and exteriors.

Laminam proves to be an appropriate solution both as a covering for doors, walls and/or floors, and as a stand-alone partition element. New technologies and updated production processes now make it possible to create products and materials that were once non-existent, as well as furnishing solutions aimed at increasing the quality of the living experience inside the home.

We have realized several projects in Laminam:

Laminam shiny statuary white
Laminam kitchen
Laminam Diamond Cream
Laminam top noir desir

 

Laminam glossy statuary white

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We are happy to share one of our latest achievements:

The frame for the television and the floor have been made in Laminam Bianco Staturario lucido.

The Laminam is the largest and thinnest ceramic slab ever seen, a skin for surfaces and volumes, capable of multiplying uses and applications.

Made using cutting-edge technology, it combines reduced thickness and large size with high resistance to stress, chemicals, wear, scratches, abrasion and bending, and is easily sanitised, resistant to frost, fire, mould and UV rays.

All the characteristics of the sheets are unalterable, remain unchanged over time and under all weather conditions.

Applications of Laminam:

  • Kitchen;
  • Bathroom;
  • Furniture;
  • Interior/exterior floors;
  • Tables;
  • Countertops;

Portoro Marble

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Portoro Marble is a very valuable stone with a deep black background and yellow-gold veins. The area of extraction is La Spezia, more precisely Portovenere.

The name Portoro derives from the Italian translation of the French term “Porte d’or” (Golden Door) by which it was called during the French domination.
Originally the name was “Misto giallo e nero” (mixed yellow and black), later it was called “Giada di Portovenere” (Portovenere Jade).

Portoro is a stone of great character and beauty: its originality and elegance make it suitable for fine claddings and modern furnishings such as fireplaces, columns, sculptures and tops.

Il Marmo Portoro - Prato Marmi

Its optimal finishing is polishing and antiquing.

Portoro can be found in the imperial villas of ancient Rome, in the most luxurious buildings of the Renaissance, in Roman churches and in the most luxurious European palaces of the 19th century, when it was used mainly in Switzerland, Belgium and France, especially in Versailles.

The fundamental detail of Portoro marble, apart from the golden veining, is the background colour, which must be as dark as possible until it reaches the so-called “sepia black”: this characteristic decisively changes the optical effect of the material itself when it is polished and laid. Portoro marble has been used for centuries in all kinds of high-level workmanship, in fact it is also found in the most beautiful historic Italian buildings.

Geologically, it is a limestone with carbonate limonite veins, formed in a calm, deep, low-oxygen marine environment rich in organic matter.

The black colour is due precisely to the richness of the organic substance, while the golden streaks derive from the partial dolomitisation of the oxidised organic substance.

What is ‘lightened’ marble?

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Lightweight marble’ is a composite material consisting of natural stone and Honeycomb (aluminium cells encased in impregnated glass fabric). Its construction makes it very versatile and, compared to traditional marble, it does not have many limitations in terms of use.

Another variable to consider is the diameter of the Honeycomb’s hexagonal aluminium cells, the smaller they are the more durable they are.

What does it look like?

We make lightweight marble composite panels by bonding thin slabs of stone to support panels with a lighter specific weight. These backing panels can be made of aluminium honeycomb, polypropylene or high density polyurethane foam.

Honeycomb panels consist of honeycomb aluminium cells enclosed in two outer skins of fibreglass or aluminium.

Their characteristics of lightness, rigidity and compressive strength make them suitable for use in the aeronautical and naval sectors.

The polypropylene panels also have a honeycomb structure and retain the same lightweight characteristics as aluminium, with the advantage of being backlit.

Polyurethane foams can be of different densities and combine lightness with the possibility of making thick panels on which holes can be drilled for fixing systems in general.

Lightweight marble panels are made by joining a stone slab, usually 2 cm thick, to two lightweight support panels, one on each side. Marble and honeycomb are glued using two-component epoxy glues that guarantee a perfect and homogeneous seal by means of machinery that creates a “vacuum” that helps to better distribute the adhesives and eliminate the presence of air that could weaken the structure of the panel.

What is lightweight marble - Prato Marmi
Why is it called lightweight marble?

The average weight of a 20 mm thick marble slab is approximately 58 kg per square metre while the average weight of a lightweight slab is 16 kg per square metre. This is why it is called “lightened marble”.

Disadvantages

Lightweight marble is a versatile solution that has the following advantages:

  • The possibility of using the stone in contexts where weight is a determining factor
  • The slabs are flexible and particularly resistant
  • Installation is quicker due to reduced weight
  • There is the possibility of producing pre-assembled elements that are easy to install
  • Using more expensive materials, lower costs for the same surface area

Uses and applications

With a few rare exceptions, light marble can find the same uses as traditional marble.

Thanks to its lightness, easy installation and superior impact resistance and flexibility capabilities, lightweight marble panels are particularly suitable for application in all those cases where weight reduction is an absolute priority, justifying the investment in complex processing:

  • Furniture coating
  • Naval sector (yachts)
  • Aeronautical sector
  • Tables
  • Consoles
  • Lift covers
  • Furniture coverings

Lightened marble is a solution that brings the particularity of the most precious natural stones to surfaces that normally could not support their weight, without compromising all the characteristics of marble.