In 1926, the author Tullio Gramantieri described the shimmering confections by Italian jeweler Mario Buccellati because the “scrumptious pointless delicacies which make up the dear package for contemporary existence.” He was talking concerning the breadth of the designer’s work—which ranged from chunky cocktail rings with gobstopper-size jewels to delicate, diamond-encrusted pendants—however gazing on the lustrous bounty of sterling silver sea creatures (mussels, lobsters, swordfish, and coral-eyed crabs) on show at “Prince of Goldsmiths—Rediscovering the Classics,” a retrospective exhibition of the hundred-year-old model’s beautiful wares at Venice’s Oficine 80 (open by way of June 18), these phrases appeared significantly resonant. I might handle with out the jewels, however the lobster centerpiece, in that second, I merely couldn’t stay with out.
It was the primary public day of the exhibition and a small crowd had gathered among the many mollusks. “Fabulous!” exclaimed Dan Thaley, the author, marketing consultant, and artwork director behind the brand new truthful Matter and Form, of the unfold. The show was not quick on showstoppers: One blue-enameled, diamond-encrusted powder case from 1968 turned loads of heads, as did a Nineteen Twenties “lace” bracelet woven from silver, gold, and diamonds. However the shellfish had been what appeared to resonate with design folks.
“Crustacean centerpieces perpetually,” the AD100 designer Billy Cotton DM’d me on Instagram, joking about his willingness to bankrupt himself for the Buccellati shellfish. (Earlier this yr, certainly one of stated centerpieces offered for $21,590 at Sotheby’s.) Later, by electronic mail, he defined additional: “I first noticed them on Madison Avenue, and I gasped. I couldn’t consider such a factor existed. For sure, a silver crustacean centerpiece elevates the on a regular basis.”
Within the Fifties, Buccellati, traditionally a jeweler, started forging silver shell-shaped dishes designed by founder Mario. Within the a long time that adopted, the Marina Assortment, an open collection that has been added to over time, was launched to encapsulate this typology. One in every of a sort creations like the big centerpieces, a lot of them designed by Mario’s son, Gianmaria, had been made for personal purchasers. “We’ve all the time tried to breed sea life in a practical means utilizing a wide range of strategies comparable to chiseling, hammering, and burnishing,” explains artistic director Andrea Buccellati who reviews that the gathering continues to be a bestseller. In 1970, The New York Instances wrote a couple of surrealism-inflected banquet on the dwelling of Luca Buccellati, who was operating the enterprise in New York on the time. In it, Luca defined merely, “These are a number of the most lovely shapes on earth. Lovely and thrilling. Far more thrilling than pure geometrical designs.”