The poetics of objects

Ladles, spoons, graters for ginger, skimmers, coffee accessories, potato peelers and bottle-openers. The small kitchen utensils presented in this video have been made by Valerio Sommella since 2013 and all share the same fluid approach to form. “I have always liked working with steel”, explains Valerio Sommella, “emphasising the aesthetic qualities and reflections that the surfaces generate”. In the Brigata collection of ladles, this aspect is highly evident: the roundness of the handle detail emphasises from an aesthetic point of view the presence of steel while from a practical point of view, makes it easier to use.

The video arose from the idea of describing the objects in a static manner, using 350° rotations around the utensils. Sound plays a key role in the video “it is hard to tell what the function is for some objects” – continues the designer – “the shape of the Bulla bottle-opener doesn’t suggest what it is used for and then Boga is a particularly strange object that you hardly ever see in the western market, a Japanese grater for ginger”. The purity of form and value of the objects emerge strongly in this video of great aesthetic simplicity in which the objects are highlighted against a material background where the textures of the various marbles can be seen, interpreted as kitchen surfaces.