For the 5th consecutive time, Corticeira Amorim ensures visibility for Portuguese cork in the world's largest design contest:
Corticeira Amorim once again will be present at the Milan Design Week, widely recognized as the greatest trend-setting international design stage. By the hand of an increasingly wider community of established and emerging designers, innovative cork projects exploring the natural, technical and aesthetic characteristics of this raw material will be showcased from the 14th to the 19th of April 2015.
The Lunch Box is a project of the TRANSIT design for the city that, taking advantage of the international phenomenon of "takeaway" lunches, presents new models of cork lunch boxes. This project, curated by T12 Lab, was created by design students at NABA (Nueva Academia Belle Arti di Milano). The project explores a concept broader than the mere production of a Lunch Box, raising awareness of the need to reduce the amount of household waste, one of the greatest challenges facing contemporary Western societies.
According to curator Dominique Kuroyanagi, the use of cork in the Lunch Box was inspired by the concept that gave rise to the project, and the need to use "a natural material with exceptional insulation properties and 100% recyclable." In her turn, tutor Lucia Cavalieri points out that "once you get in contact with cork, you can easily realize the quality that this natural material has to offer."
Exit is a project designed by Studio Irvine for MatteoBrioni, a designer known for his connection to natural materials. The project features a new modular system suitable for both floorings and walls. Designed with materials such as cork (still in the prototyping stage), marble and terra cotta combined with raw earth, Exit is based on the earth colour palette of the clay and has a natural texture. The use of earthy colours, the different possible configurations, the range of the high quality materials are the ingredients that make Exit a highly customizable system.
And, in a week where Milan becomes the city of design, the Museo del Novecento presents the project "James Irvine. An English Man in Milan", a tribute to the famous British industrial designer. The exhibition, sponsored by Corticeira Amorim and curated by Maria Cristina Didero and Marco Sammicheli, focuses on the famous "treasure boxes" by James Irvine and shows the designer's most important works, as well as prototypes, sketches and different materials he would use for his projects. Among the projects on display, there are two pieces designed by James Irvine for Corticeira Amorim, shortly before his untimely death. These pieces occupy a prominent position on the exhibition: SIX, a portable mini wine cellar of the Amorim's MATERIA collection that was launched in 2014 and STOW IT, a wall-shelf, which was part of the Metamorphosis project (2013). These two pieces evidence the connection of the designer to this natural material.
Carlos de Jesus, head of Marketing and Communication at Corticeira Amorim, said: "The fact that we at Corticeira Amorim are challenged to take part in various initiatives at the world's leading design venue is a clear sign not only of the prestige that the cork enjoys today, but also a validation of the company's strategy, which has long identified this area as one of great potential."
It should be noted that since 2011 - the year Corticeira Amorim first presented its MATERIA collection at the Milan Design Week - Amorim has always been present at the event. In 2013, Corticeira Amorim was a partner to BMWi and the French designers Ronan & Erwan Bouroullec, who designed together a cork installation featuring a visionary concept of sustainable mobility. Last year, Amorim joined forces with Wallpaper and US designer Todd Bracher to bring us a cork jacket.
