Today led by Daniela Fantini, the company expresses itself through lightness and elegance, sobriety, environmental balance and gentle traits: the new Flora line by Vincent Van Duysen is the expression of this

That of Fantini, “Italian design factory”, is the story of a company that from small village of Pella, on the shores of Lake Orta, in northern Italy, has spread around the world high-end products created by the most famous designers and has created a series of emblematic projects linked to the environment and the valorisation of its territory.

"I strongly believe that a company should never ignore some fundamental values: ethics, respect for the environment and for people. And it must have a precise social responsibility to share with its collaborators and its customers" explains Daniela Fantini and specifies: "all our projects they are born from curiosity and the desire to continue to experiment which still today, after 70 years, is the engine of our creativity.

Jockeyhood

The term, Daniela Fantini recalls, was coined by Dr. Sartori, as he has always affectionately called Renato Sartori, a strategy consultant for many years, Fantini's marketing and communications.

“We have always worked with designers, they are the antennas on trends and on the market, the interaction with them brings into the company what identifies our hand. Some of the most important international designers are involved in the design of the products and we believe they are in tune with the company's philosophy.

The characterizing result is to have a range with a very wide series of formal and expressive languages which are also deliberately very different from each other, although united by a thin common thread that we could call 'contemporaneity' and by other more subtle characteristics formal - a certain lightness, a non-banal elegance, something gentle... - which constitute the specific characteristic of Fantini products compared to the taps of other companies, with that specific identity which is recognized precisely as fantininess".

I Balocchi, Fantini's icon

“Born by chance, the Balocchi designed in the 70s by Davide Mercatali and Paolo Pedrizzetti, are the watershed that highlighted Fantini's DNA", says Daniela Fantini. “It was my father - who passed away suddenly when I was young, I was 28, in 1990 - who found that sketch at the bottom of a folder of project proposals for Fantini that the two architects had prepared.

With a gesture of green marker Mercatali had drawn the Toys, while he chatted... And he was immediately certain that he had to produce it! Here: that is the moment in which the attentive antennas of the designers bring the new trend, with an entrepreneur ready to welcome".

The Toys were presented for the first time at the Mostra Convegno di Milano in 1978 in an installation, designed by Mercatali and Pedrizzetti, which was entitled “The Land of Toys ” in homage to Collodi and Pinocchio, making the tap, a small functional accessory without identity, the protagonist of the bathroom environment.

For the first time a product linked only to metal, until then always seen only as a technical element, was colored and its playful and aesthetic aspect prevailed.

The market response was enormous: Compasso d'Oro ADI selection in 1979, BIO of Ljubljana in 1981, protagonist of the covers of sector magazines and included in various museum collections of the most important designs in the world. “It was an instinctive project – stated Paolo Pedrizzetti – both on our part and on the part of the company.

The strength of the product is that the original idea was not mediated by market research or other rational considerations. The way of dialogue between client and designer, starting from our intuition, was spontaneous and naive. The innovation lies in the overall, cartoon-like image. New, joyful, carefree, young image for young people. An image that I think is still relevant."

“I often ask myself – confides Daniela Fantini – when faced with that folder with the Balocchi drawing at the bottom, would I have understood it too or would I have thought of it as a strange product without a market? The main concern, after taking over from my father, was the choice of product.

Fantini is not a company that can develop through volumes, quantities, prices. I realized that the only possible way of development was to continue to put original products on the market, which told something new.

Perhaps my father had this innate ability to choose, to intuit and identify the right product and designer. So I tried to rely on those who know how to do it better than me, which doesn't mean delegating, but growing and learning. Many factors had made me choose collaborators who gave me a strong push in terms of image and safety in proceeding, like Doctor Sartori, a pillar for us".

Read also: Remembering Renato Sartori 

The new Flora collection by Vincent Van Duysen

“Sometimes products are born with characteristics that are immediately consistent with us,” says Daniela Fantini. “In the case of Flora it was her idea without a brief (actually: we had given her a completely different one!)… she called me to submit her idea of 'Industrial Chic ' which he believed corresponded to a trend. When you sent me this project, I thought you defined it right.

We worked together on the proportions and details of the handle. You have to choose a designer who understands the brand and transmits the sensitivity acquired... For us this means interfacing".

She tells Van Duysen: “Flora materialized organically from my desire to create a timeless collection imbued with a nostalgic nod to the past. It is a highly tactile and ergonomic collection. The single and double levers take center stage, giving a strong charm and character to the entire collection. I constantly look for a sort of symbiosis in all my projects. We have a common understanding when it comes to design with Fantini.

It is an archetypal and sophisticated object. The low and generous proportions instill sensuality in Flora. Volta has an industrial aesthetic infused with modern sensibilities. We paid a lot of attention to the proportions. It is a very human and personal collection."

Fantini and social responsibility

Fantini is also committed to social responsibility: the “100 Fantini Fountains for Africa” project consists of the construction of the aqueduct in the Masango area, in Burundi, to bring clean water to those who don't have it.

An important Corporate Social Responsibility initiative that has contributed to improving the daily lives of over 25,000 people, especially women and children. Initially, with the involvement of Daniela Fantini personally and, since 2012, also with the support of the company and the entire world of its distribution.