Sicis has brought mosaic production into the 21st century

By Louis Iannaco
Hicksville, N.Y.—Italian manufacturers continue to set the trends for the industry by working with leading architects/ designers, state-of-the-art technology and drawing inspiration from the world of fashion and the great outdoors, noted Christine Abbate of Ceramic Tiles of Italy.

“That’s why avant-garde fabric patterns, funky animal prints, artistic floral motifs, sleek metallic sheens, three-dimensional forms, bursting bubbles, Asian-flair and urban-style products took the crowd visiting Cersaie last October by storm and are sure to make headlines this season.”

Several of the introductions starting to be seen include an array of faux-fabrics—from silk to damask to denim. Astor’s Klis, silk spelled backwards, is a glazed porcelain that resembles the fiber. Supergres also chose to explore this material and paired 10 x 18 inch textured tiles with subtle floral listellos in its new collection, Arke Wall. Bannero’s Time 1:37 includes a line of silky tiles as well as one that features crocheted patterns. Atlas Concorde adds to the category with Flair.

From skins and prints to decorative animal images, Italian tile producers are bringing the wild kingdom to life in every shape and form. Set-tecento’s Animalier walks on the wild side with surfaces imitating tiger, leopard, zebra and cobra skins. Panaria’s Exochic is an abstract interpretation of animals in their natural environment. The surface is a mixture of zebra stripes, cheetah spots and African ferns. Ceramica Di Treviso arranged its mini 1cm mosaics, part of the Decori collection, to look like snakeskin. Bisazza’s Sahara collection includes two lines: Giraffe, designed by Carlo Dal Bianco, and Zebra.

New waves of floral and botanical motifs are making a big splash in the tile industry this year. Supergres is pulling out all the stops—from a multi-petal flower made out of pearl-shaped drops of glaze to colorful layers of foilage, the B-Kind collection is designed to be an alternative to wallpaper. Several of Majorca’s new introductions, including One O One and Flair, also illustrate 3D glazed floral decors. Arpa’s Style mixes youthful colors and modish flowery motifs, while Sir Tiles’ Exotica uses a more neutral palette to enhance its relief-decors.

Like the lyrics to a popular song, “It don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that bling,” it seems the manufacturers of Italian tile took these words to heart when producing their new collections. Viva fused metal onto the Backstage collection’s 1cm thick through-body porcelain tile slabs. The resulting glaze was then colored and honed to yield extraordinary metallic effects and patterns in yellow/green, red/orange, red/white and blue/black. Viva’s other introduction, Nouvelle Vague, is reminiscent of cast iron, while Tagina pulled the trigger with its new gunmetal-colored collection, Fucina.

Raised surfaces, 3D shapes and bas-relief weaves are bringing texture to an all-time high in 2007. Monocibec’s Enigma resembles a puzzle of 3D pieces that jut out from the surface of the tile. Provenza’s Partitura from the Eco dell ‘Atlante series boasts two large formats: 24 x 35 and 12 x 35, and a surface that looks like a basketweave of miniature squares. Mutina’s Day to Day collection consists of small cubes made of extruded porcelain stoneware while Ceramica Bianco comes in a bas-relief, elongated checkered pattern. Fondovalle’s B.Fusion also offers a similar motif.