He reminds you of a modern Geppetto but he is a master carpenter
Giorgio Romani: carpenter by profession, artist by vocation. His creations in wood can be found in Siena in the quality handicraft boutique called Toscana Lovers
seen for you by Donatella Cinelli Colombini
Siena- Toscana Lovers – creations in wood by Giorgio Romani
The olive wood tells the centenary story of the tree from which it has come from. Hot years, cold periods, lightning, pruning … s series of curved lines which resemble rhythmic music that the artists indulges, turns, hollows until he finds a perfect harmony. This is how Giorgio Romani’s creations are born; he is a young and modern Geppetto who arrives in the Tuscan hills straight from Abruzzo to work with wood. His are pure essential shake, attended to in every detail. Shapes that hide the skill and I might say the virtuosity behind apparent simplicity. For example the bowl is so thin so as to let through the light, while the rim of the soup tureen is chiselled by hand so as to be pleasant to touch.….
Then there are the true sculptures where Giorgio plays with a tree trunk, he hollows it like a bird wanting to make a nest and in the end he finds a type of harmony now lost between man and nature. But this is another story destined
Giorgio Romani in his workshop
to contemporary art galleries.
Our business, on the other hand, are the objects made by Giorgio Romani in common use, those that the Toscana Lovers clients put on the tables laid with tablecloths made By the 19th century looms by Busatti and where the knives and forks are made by Saladini master knife maker from Scarperia and the dishes are by Ceramiche Virginia.
This is Tuscany told by a history of great artisans, handicraft objects which fascinate the whole world with their simple finesse. These objects are chosen one by one by Chiara Nesi
Giorgio Romani
and Carlo Gardini for the “Toscana Lovers” shop in Piazza Indipendenza, just round the corner from Piazza del Campo where the Palio di Siena horse race is run. In the centre of the most beautiful medieval city in Italy it is possible to rediscover the pleasure of hand made objects.
The Toscana Lovers shop belongs to Donatella Cinelli Colombini and her husband Carlo Gardini, who was born in the apartment immediately above the shop.