Imola, Del Conca, Sicis, Florim, Marazzi, Caesar and more

By Calista Sprague

Cersaie once again attracted throngs of designers, architects and other visitors to Bologna, Italy for the world’s largest exhibition of ceramic tile and bathroom furnishings. From September 22 to 26, the vast Bologna Exhibition Centre housed 945 exhibitors that showcased their products to 100,985 attendees from around the world.

Although ceramic tile was the obvious focal point of Cersaie, as it always has been, organizers expanded the exhibition offerings this year to include marble, natural stone and wood coverings. In a press conference, Armando Cafiero, general manager of the Ceramic Industry Trade Association of Italy, cited “the opportunity to become more and more interesting to professionals around the world” as the reasoning behind the show’s wider scope.

Cafiero’s hopes were fulfilled, since attendance was up on almost all fronts, especially among international visitors. Compared to 2013, this year’s show boasted 45 more exhibitors, 0.2% more visitors overall, 3.6% more “first admissions” and 4.1% more international visitors.

In addition to an endless labyrinth of tile exhibits, attendees enjoyed several presentations, including a keynote lecture from Pritzker prize-winning architect Toyo Ito. The Building Dwelling Thinking program, now in its sixth year, offered training credits for architects for the first time this year, and Tiling Town offered training for tile setters as well as installation demonstrations. The vignettes at Cer-Sea focused on extending the vacation season with seaside retail spaces and attractions for use throughout the year.

Ed Bakos, architect and managing director at Champalimaud Design in New York, summed up the Cersaie experience from the specifier’s point of view: “The goal is to get a broad overview of what’s out there. We’re prisoners of what we know, and this gives us a chance to see what’s available.”

AWARD WINNING TILE
This year, the Italian Association for Industrial Design bestowed its first ADI Ceramics Design Award, honoring innovation and outstanding design in ceramics. Fioranese, a 50-year-old company from Fiorano Modenese, Italy, took first prize for its Urban Avenue collection, described as “porcelain stoneware with the look of bricks that pays homage to industrial design, loft living and the high rises found in the large conurbations in the industrialized West,” although the tiles more resemble aged stone or distressed cement than brick. The winning tiles measure 8”x16” and come in Off White, Shaded Beige, Full Grey, Dark Copper and Graffiti.

ARTIST PAIRINGS
Several tile manufacturers paired with artists, resulting in some of this year’s most memorable ceramic creations.

Ascot highlighted the work of late American artist Keith Haring for its new Game of Fifteen series. Haring’s well known line drawings, like Radiant Baby and Barking Dog, adorn the 8”x8” and 8”x24” tiles in glossy black and white, suitable for walls or floors. Fourteen additional contemporary artists will follow to complete the series.

The work of renowned pop artist Roy Lichtenstein appears on Imola Ceramica’s wall tiles in the Pop Collection. The line offers a blast of ten bold, almost neon colors on glossy, 3D textured 5”x13” tiles to intermingle with ten of Lichtenstein’s striking images.

Robert Dawson lent his hand to Ceramica Bardelli for two different wall tile series. For Arianna, he deconstructed a medieval knot pattern. The series consists of 16 ingeniously interchangeable tiles with double lines that can be combined to create chains, Celtic knots, small circles and an endless array of custom loops and wandering lines. The tiles come in gloss or matte white and matte black with pure gold silkscreen lines. The Blue Willow and Ruby Willow line carry Dawson’s signature elements extracted from the Blue Willow china pattern on glossy or matte 12” white tiles.

Refin Ceramiche unveiled Filo, a group of four graphic designs based on the Tron-like computer line drawings of Italian architects Alessandro and Francesco Mendini. The two created the series “to give electricity, movement to the space.” The four graphics are meant to be placed randomly throughout a space for walls or floors, and they come in four colors on 30” squares.

Refin also held a design competition won by Kasia Zareba, a Polish-born designer, who now boasts her own Refin tile line called Fossil. The tiles are covered in undulating rows of hand drawn dashes inspired by “the prehistoric imprints left by plants and animals in rock formations.” The 30” square tiles come in four patterns and three colors: Fossil Beige, Fossil Brown and Fossil Grey.

SHAPE AND PROFILE INNOVATIONS
ABK’s thin Auto-leveling tiles flex enough to allow for dry-setting with no cement backer board, grout or adhesive necessary—perfect for DIYers. The Auto-leveling slats come in 8”x68”, 12”x48” and 3”x11”. Although the product’s developer presented the tiles at the show, he remained tight-lipped as to the ingredient list, saying only that the tiles are made of 40% recycled material and “new composition.” According to the company, the planks are produced to be slightly convex for easier installation, and “when laid on the screed, the planks self level due to their own weight.”

Del Conca offers two new innovative tiles that help solve the same problem in different ways, catching the eye of Champalimaud Design’s Bakos. “The look of a well tiled space always comes down to how you address corners,” he explained. “In most tiles, the biscuit, which is the body, is colored differently from the finished face, and you see it along the edge, which means that you have to be careful how you detail outside corners. I liked the thicker product because it was integrally colored [same color all the way through] and I could imagine using it where the edge would be visible, which gives a more substantial and therefore richer feeling.”

“One of the most interesting tiles I saw was a tile that was curved to wrap around an outside corner. It was really beautiful, almost like a bullnose brick, that solves the problem nicely in a thin tile,” Bakos said. In addition to the new curved tiles for outside wall corners, Del Conca’s Foreste d’Italia collection offers wood-look plank tiles with a finished bullnose edge or squared edge meant for stair treads or other applications where flooring edges might be exposed, eliminating any visible cuts.

Caesar showcased the Aextra 20 line, named for its 20mm thickness (just over 3/4”), intended for outdoor flooring.

Hexagons are hot this year, and practically every manufacturer now produces the six-sided shape as an option. The Kale display touted the hexagon as “timeless elegance, the coexistence of past and modern with a Mediterranean touch.”

Two companies put a different spin on the hexagon, deconstructing it to create interesting design systems. In its Nest collection, designed by HOK Product Design, Lea Ceramiche offers a hexagon with a triangular spoke cutout from one side and interchangeable triangles in nine new colors for a multitude of combinations. The tiles are part of the Slimtech line at 3mm thick and come in sizes up to 34”x39”.

Mirage played on the shape’s name for its line XGone. As the name implies, a hexagon-shaped space is left open on one side of the larger hexagon tiles, allowing for smaller tiles to be inserted. The tiles come in three sizes, nine colors and lined or polka dot options for an endless array of combinations. The line was designed by a young architect team, Lavinia Modesti and Javier Deferrari, who submitted the idea for Mirage’s online design competition. The tiles are suitable for use in commercial or residential settings on walls or floors.

Marazzi combed through its vaults to bring back its ceramic puzzle pieces, first introduced in 1960. The whimsical tiles will appear in contemporary colors to coordinate with the rest of the Marazzi line, and they range in size from 4”x6” to 24”x37”.

SIZE WARS
The race for the biggest slab is on. Florim and AVA currently hold the lead with their 5’3”x10’6” “monster slabs,” replicating stone, metal, cement and other materials, and several other companies offer slightly smaller slab tiles. Both Florim and AVA offer the slabs in 6mm thickness for floor and wall use. However, installation requires a thick-set under the tile to avoid issues with cracking and warping due to subfloor imperfections or movement in the floor, hampering the widespread use of these behemoth slabs.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, Manifatture Ceramiche of the Serenissima Cir group focused on small tiles for its Chicago collection, creating realistic brick looks to mimic reclaimed bricks in 4”x8” and—not to be left out of the fad—hexagons of 11”x161/2”. The company used actual bricks shipped in from Chicago to create authentic inkjet renderings, and the colors are named South Side, State Street, Old Chicago and Wrigley, ranging from a whitewashed beige to a rustic orange-red. City Mix tiles, available in all four colors, come stamped with Chicago and other American city names. The collection follows a similar line in greys named New York.

COLOR AND TEXTURES
The drab days of recession tile have officially faded, and color has returned to Cersaie. Manufacturers still offer plenty of neutral hues, but many now punctuate their lines with exciting bursts of color. Sicis’ mosaics glisten with real silver and gold against lush reds, purples and pinks. Imola Ceramica offers a whole line of pastels and another of bright primaries. ABK even splashed its wood look with streaks of bold red, blue and yellow “paint.” Many exhibitors showed wall tiles with exciting new 3D textures.

Ornamenta’s new Identity line goes through the kiln three times, giving their graphics depth that you can feel as well as see. The dashes and dots of the Allover and Gessato patterns, as well as the glasses motif of Frames, are slightly recessed, seeming to be set into the tiles, conveying a luxurious feel. The ultra modern 24” square tiles come in three colors: Sky Led, Carbon and Bronze.

Sant’Agostino expanded its Flexible Architecture line, designed by Philip Starck, to include a flooring system called Flex Technic. The line incorporates texture to allow for a variety of designs. The tiles come in a smooth finish, rough finish or smooth center with a rough border on one or more sides, resembling a heavy grout line. The 24” tiles come in four colors—white, taupe, grey and black.

WOOD, STONE AND METAL
The ubiquitous wood, marble and stone looks maintain their strong foothold, found in at least one corner of practically every booth, despite grumblings from designers and architects who pine for something new. Metal looks also remain popular, with aged patinas still strong.

Inkjet technology continues to improve, resulting in sometimes stunning reproductions of wood, metal, marble, concrete and other traditional surfaces. Notable this year is 41zero42’s charred wood look, Yaki, inspired by an ancient Japanese wood technique. The finely detailed crackled look comes in matte and gloss, 6”x48” or 6”x12” in four colors.

Also memorable are Sant’Agostino’s Blendart rustic wood looks. Replicating dark weathered wood planks, distressed painted wood planks and distressed painted plywood, the Blendart tiles stand apart from other wood lines as unique and ultra-realistic. Although they look like 4” planks, the tiles come in sheets of 12”x47”, and the plywood look comes in 36” squares.

The Marmoker Series by Casalgrande Padana offers almost two dozen stone and marble looks, many of which possess impressive detail and visual depth. The 24”x24” and 24”x48” tiles come in a polished or matte finish, and all are available with Bios antibacterial and Bios Self-Cleaning, making them appropriate for hospital and restaurant applications.

Caesar’s Trace series was inspired by the great Italian buildings of the past. The line features six textured metallic finishes, mimicking iron, oxidized copper, bronze and aluminum in a variety of sizes and patinas. The tiles are available in natural and iridescent finishes.

LOOKING AHEAD
Many designers who visited Cersaie lamented the fact that inkjet technology has been limited thus far to the replication of other materials. Some would like to see the technology used to enhance the tile material itself rather than using it merely as a backdrop for a photo of a completely different material. Some are excited about the expanded options offered with 3D textures. Others are more interested in the continuing innovations to eliminate grout lines, or as in the Flex Technic line, exaggerating the grout lines on the tile itself creative combinations. And they all seem to be anticipating the next big thing to emerge from the unlimited possibilities of current technology, or from some brand new technology yet to be discovered.

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