Super bowl: designers are throwing shapes in the pasta world

From the elaborate radiatori and campanelle to the minimal pici and fazzoletti, pasta shapes issue from every corner of Italy, and you’d be forgiven for thinking there’s little room left for invention.
However, it’s a challenge that has been embraced this year by a curious collective, which launched a new short-form pasta, Alma, during Milan Design Week earlier this year. Product designer Chiara Andreatti (W*225) and photographer Alice Schillaci, of Casalinghe di Tokyo (a product brand Schillaci conceived to celebrate the beauty of the everyday object), joined forces to come up with the look, while the manufacture has been a combined effort by two top pasta factories, Trafile Turconi and Baradello.
The curvy organic shape is described by the team as ‘female’ and was born, like many a project, while the two designers shared a pasta meal. Integral to the creation of Alma is the gesture used to eat it: an elbow planted on the table (‘indifferent to etiquette’), the pasta filling the mouth between chatter and laughter.
Made with Senatore Cappelli organic wheat, ancestor of the modern durum wheat, Alma is a true product of fresh design heads applied to old materials and craft.
A version of this article originally appeared in the July 2019 issue of Wallpaper* (W*244)
INFORMATION
chiaraandreatti.com; casalingheditokyo.com
Receive our daily digest of inspiration, escapism and design stories from around the world direct to your inbox.
-
A European-style café opens next to London’s Saatchi Gallery
Designed by Dion & Arles, Cafe Linea serves fresh pâtisseries, global dishes and sparkling wines in a stunning Grade II-listed setting
-
Home is where Beethoven Market is – a joyful Italian restaurant in LA’s Mar Vista
In Mar Vista, a historic space is reborn as a modern-day gathering spot, an Italian-infused restaurant where rotisserie chicken, handmade pasta and tableside tiramisu welcome you like family
-
This Canadian house is a precise domestic composition perched on the Nova Scotian coast
Bishop McDowell completed a new Canadian house overlooking the Atlantic, using minimal details and traditional forms to create a refined family home
-
Milan’s Triennale Design Museum spills the beans on the art of food (and food of art)
-
Buccellati sets the table for conviviality at Milan Design Week 2022
Designers Dimorestudio, Ashley Hicks, Chahan Minassian and Patricia Urquiola create spectacular dinner table designs for Buccellati’s Milan Design Week exhibition, ’Il Galateo – a journey into conviviality’
-
We’re at the sharp end of sophisticated postprandial entertaining with our tool kit
-
In Milan, the Wallpaper* Handmade space offers new launches, exuberant bars and more
-
Eat, drink and shop your way round Milan during Salone with Picky Nicky
-
Dinner, drinks and disco: Salone del Mobile’s top entertainment installations
-
India Mahdavi creates a pink Parisian fantasy in Ladurée’s Tokyo tea salon
-
Artist’s Palate: Tokujin Yoshioka’s wagashi