VOGUE PELLE, marzo `08

New talents

3D LEATHER

Fossils,shells,barrier reef, elements from the undergrowth and rock formations. Nature, with all its poetry and complicated simplicity, is the inspiration behind the bag sculptures by the fashion designer Sonia Guzzo.

Italian by birth, but a Londoner by adoption, after having completed her studies in Textile Design at the Chelsea College of Art & Design, and having shown an outstanding flair for three-dimesional ideas, she came up with a 3D process, based on an embroidery technique adapted to the leather but previously experimented on silk.

Her bags are polymorphic handmade objects, the result of constant research. What fascinates Sonia Guzzo is challenging a smooth surface and transforming and moulding this as if it were clay in order to cast light and shadows. The leather unfolds, it rouches and curls, forms appendices through which silk thread is sewn into.

Her creations are sought after by concept stores, art galleries and private collectors in search of an accessory that has something to say, be it the suggestion of a memory or a dreamed-of destination.

Despite a glut of inspiration from the natural world in its often rather neutral colours, Sonia Guzzo loves alternating  a luminous palette with vivid nuances: red. violet, emerald, turquoise,orange, antique gold, pewter, and also aubergine and browns. For S/S she worked mainly with nappas and focused on rounded shapes, reminescent of the Sun and of  Infinity. The colours chosen are warm and bright like red and orange. A made in England range but with the possibility of production going back to Italy, plus an increase of the range with purses, clutch bags and eyewear cases.