programme: communication of furnishings for assisted living facilities

client: cit-malvestio

team: sophia los

collaborators: MMBF (graphic design), studio visus (photography), studio pitari (photography), nude design studio (rendering)

city/area: padua, italy 

status: completed, 2007-2010

Project related to the communication of furniture for assisted living facilities for Alzheimer patients. Collections: “Rialto”, “Domino”, Taiga”, “Agorà”. The catalogues of furnishings for assisted living facilities embodied the uselessness of the elderly: sad spaces, lacking in vitality, empty. The new catalogues are the first in Italy and perhaps Europe to frame the guests’ everyday experiences in the facilities in a welcoming yet realistic way. This approach rejects the usual trend of swaying from fake hotels to desolate nursing homes.

While collaborating with Cit-Malvestio, a leading company in hospital services in Italy, in 2012, I worked as a consultant for grants on the furnishing of assisted living homes and proposed some custom solutions.

programme: slow tea cluster pavilion outfitting

client: slow tea cluster, with milan expo 2015, KIP

team: sophia los

graphic design: loriana martin

city/area: milan expo – italy

status: unrealised, 2015

International Slow Tea Association is a worldwide non-profit and non-governmental organisation dedicated to promoting quality teas, fair-trade production and consumption, and tea culture.

Slow Tea supports and promotes initiatives defending local tea traditions; it supports small tea producers their values and knowledge by enabling sustainable tea production that protects local biodiversity.

In the KIP EXPO Pavilion’s “Multipurpose Space for Partners Expositions”, Slow Tea International organised a SLOW TEA CLUSTER: a space dedicated to all the organisations, institutions and companies (producers and traders) active in the promotion of sustainable tea production, such as the National Tea Board, tea producers, tea farmers, tea estates, universities and research institutes, national and international tea organisations.

Shortly before the inauguration, the event was cancelled due to a contingency.

programme: co-artistic director, displays, furniture design

client: morelato

team: sophia los

city/area: salizzole (VR), italy

status: completed 2007-2016

Our collaboration with Morelato cabinetmakers began in 2007, and, for about a decade, I helped the company in all their activities and initiatives: from marketing consulting and the artistic direction of their catalogues, to planning the displays of their merchandise at various national and international fairs, planning showroom out-fittings, displays for the MAAM museum. Moreover, I also designed some furniture pieces, like the “Maschera” system and the four poster bed “Nomade”, still produced today. 

The company combines its production with a rich cultural activity partnering with the Triennale Milano. Every year Morelato launches a design competition and other initiatives through the Aldo Morelato Foundation, based in Villa Dionisi, home to MAAM – Museum of Applied Arts and Contemporary Furniture.

I invited them to create a suite for the Benè fair, introducing the “Nomade” bed. The bookshelf “Maschera” resulted from our collaboration during the 2007 Luxury Expo in Verona.

The MAAM catalogue design and the logos restyling are the work of my brother Pietro Los whom I involved in 2010.

Damir Jellici curated the catalogues featuring photography by Alberto Sinigaglia and subsequently by Emozioni studio.

https://www.morelato.it/ita/list/cataloghi

http://fondazionealdomorelato.org/pages/73

programme: exhibition display

client: ellevì antichità

team: sophia los

city/area: stella maris church, porto cervo, italy

status: completed, july 2018

An exhibition of works by Doménikos Theotokópoulos – also known as El Greco – an extraordinary painter, was the perfect occasion to mark the 50th anniversary of the Stella Maris church’s solemn consecration, while additionally realising the Director of Ellévi Antichità Letizia Valoti’s desire to bring some essential works from the Master’s life to Porto Cervo. El Greco’s artistic maturity, which he reached over his ten years of living in Italy, is displayed by a miniature on copper, a rare beauty depicting “San Francis in prayer”. The item is an extremely recent discovery of prof. Lionello Puppi presented to the general public for the first time ever in the Stella Maris church.

In addition to the exhibition, the event included a talk featuring Mariella Lobefaro, an expert on icons, and prof. Lionello Puppi, prof. Emeritus of Methodologies of Art History at Ca’ Foscari University, Venice as panellists. 

Designed by architect Michele Busiri Vici in the now typical style of Costa Smeralda, the church is an organic and plastic space. The baptistry, where we installed the exhibition, is a low irregular chamber with a vaulted ceiling. It wasn’t possible to use the walls to show the paintings. I conceived a three-dimensional frame of large dimensions instead of a glass case, a sort of “frame-space” one could walk around gradually discovering the precious works by El Greco.

The display was created thanks to the precious contribution of craftspeople and friends Nico Filigheddu, Gianni Filigheddu (Aire) and their collaborators.

At the last minute, as prof. Puppi was indisposed, prof. Nano Chatzidakis, PhD, Prof. Of Byzantine Art and Archaeology at the University of Ioannina (Greece), substituted prof. Puppi. This little exhibition is very dear to me, and I am grateful to Letizia for letting me meet Lionello Puppi one last time. This project is dedicated to him.

2005 marks the beginning of a ten-year collaboration with Studio Event, creator and organiser of an innovative trade fair: Benè Wellness expo, at the Vicenza Expo Centre. We worked side by side to organise the whole fair, and I personally curated the architecture section. I experimented with an innovative and effective communication strategy to attract a diverse public. The content was in tune with the target/interests, and it provided information they wouldn’t otherwise seek out on their own. We maintained this approach over the following years, variating the themes.

Here we present a selection.

Concept, art direction and organisation of a special event: “La barchessa bioclimatica”, within Fiera Bené. Sentieri di Benessere. 

The bioclimatic barchessa provided the expo with a module of the typical vernacular architecture of Veneto. The goal was highlighting the bioclimatic qualities of rural construction. 

The event included a symposium and a related book with the patronage of Ordine degli Architetti P.P.C. of Vicenza. 

The speakers invited included expert historians (Lionello Puppi and Giuseppe Barbieri) alongside Sergio Los, a pioneer in bioclimatic architecture.

The speakers’ panel included Lionello Puppi and Giuseppe Barbieri, who addressed the historical issues, alongside Sergio Los, a pioneer of bioclimatic architecture, highlighting the environmental aspects.

“Architettura per il Veneto verso uno sviluppo sostenibile” – Fiera Bené, Vicenza, 5 novembre 2005

Organizzatore e moderatore: Sophia Los

Speackers: Prof. Lionello Puppi, Prof. Giuseppe Barbieri, Prof. Sergio Los, Arch. Giuseppe Pilla. with the patronage of Ordine Architetti P.P.C.  di Vicenza.

programme: exhibition stand

client: grigiante casa bio

team: sophia los

collaborator: marta stocco

city/area: spazio casa – vicenza expo centre (VI), italy

status: completed, 2014

As part of a broader consultation related to re-organising the showroom, we designed the stand for the Spazio Casa expo in Vicenza. Grigiante are pioneering carpenters of biocompatible furniture. The pieces are made in-house, and the merchandise displayed in their showroom represents a very accurate selection of what quality living offers in the way of health and comfort. 

First of all, we tasked our commissioners to define a profile – a portrait – of the people whom the stand was addressing. The goal was to identify a suitable target for their brand and then build the exhibition around it. We simulated the house rooms adding details, accessories and photographs like on a film set, imagining how the family we envisioned would live in it. We arrived at a synthesis of the various characteristics emerging from the single components of the company. The stand was visible from afar, as a poetic tree house stood out, recalling the Fujimori pavillions, here freely re-interpreted by the company’s master carpenters.

Art: Paolo Savegnago and Stefano Zattera

Doors & windows: Infixall (VI)

Candles: Candele e Affini (VI)

programme: vinitaly stand

client: kurtin farm

team: sophia los

with: davide charlie ceccon, manuel cuman (graphic design)

city/area: verona expo (VR) – italy

status: completed, 2018

The project for this stand was designed to offer visitors an imaginary space, a life-size version of the landscape surrounding the winery, drawn by Davide Charlie Ceccon. The display introduced to the Veronese Expo the new management of the winery and the new wine labels, designed by the artist.

photos: davide charlie ceccon

programme: co-artistic direction, displays, furniture design

client: benè sentieri di benessere, morelato srl

team: sophia los

city/area: vicenza – italy

status: completed, 2006

The suite belongs to the broader project for the whole Benè – Sentieri di Benessere expo, which in 2006 included a pavilion called “Bené Wellness Resort, il Benessere Oltre la Spa”, curated by Stefano Pediconi. On that occasion, various architects designed a range of suites, unveiled at the expo.

The concept for the project comes from the desire to present hosts with a room including a small garden acting as the cardinal symbol of wellness.

The suite is a large bedroom placed between the volume of the bathroom and the winter garden.

The bathroom volume appears like a full-height wooden tapestry, hiding the sliding door that makes it possible to access the room from the shower.

The bedroom’s central element is the natural cherry wood four-poster bed, Tobia bed, designed by Sophia Los for Morelato. The bathroom is in white stone, and it features a panel made of multiple agate round pieces, acting as a backdrop to the shower. The panel is backlit, thus resembling a thousand eyes gazing at the room when the sliding door is open. The piece recalls Klimt paintings and has a remarkable chromatic effect.

Morelato Arredamenti created the wooden tapestry after a custom design, a reinterpretation of the “Zero” series, conceived to produce a dynamic wall. The effect is achieved by placing wooden laths according to an irregular pattern. The four-poster bed was presented as a prototype during the expo and was dressed with textiles by Dominique Kieffer for Rubelli, here proposing a dedicated eco-friendly line. The materials used to paint walls were eco-friendly products supplied by Spring Color. Mandruzzato Marmi made the bathroom, and Punto Verde provided the plants for the veranda. Porceilain sets by l’IDEA – Vicenza.

Benè Wellness Expo – 2005 Edition

Concept, project and organisation of the special event “Interni in Verde (published project).

Related symposium organised by Sophia Los.

First time event in Italy for Patrick Blanc. With the collaboration of Ordine degli Architetti of Vicenza and AIAPP.

“Interni in verde. The art of designing spaces with plants” – Flavio Albanese meets Patrick Blanc. Moderator: Sophia Los. Guest speakers: Marco Ferreri, Natasha Pulitzer, Martin Pontgraz, Alexis Trecoire (simultaneous interpretation: Miuccia Breda).

The possibilities offered by plants as architectural elements can help achieve a higher quality of living. Exploring how greenery can affect interiors is the central theme of “Interni in Verde”, part of the special event “Abitare Bio” by Benè, focused on highly comfortable relaxing spaces and work environments.

The “Interni in Verde” project, curated by architect Sophia Los, alongside landscape designer Luca Parolin, represents a unique mix of natural science and design. Furniture, accessories, lighting and plants are used as elements of a composition, allowing the architect to improve indoor spaces.

Greenery, outside its more evident decorative function, takes on a significant role in the distribution and organisation of spaces, becoming a green wall. Besides the known positive effect on mood and microclimates, studies led by NASA show the air-purifying properties of some species, like those used for the expo. They include smog and formaldehyde-reducing plants, like Dracaenas, Ivy, Ficus trees, and Tillandsias, which can filter several polluting particles.

The exhibited project extends across 160 sq. m, divided into an office area and a hotel suite, to better exemplify all the different plant uses in lived spaces. The display begins with the office area, moving to a living area, and ends with the hotel suite.

The symposium was recorded and distributed as an eponymous DVD produced by the Benè Wellness Expo. https://www.studiosol.it/stampa/interni-in-verde/

Published on “Interni”.

programme: concept, artistic direction, displays, eco-wellness resort event and eco-spa suite

client: benè wellness expo

team: sophia los

with: tiziano marchetto, loriana martin (graphic design)

city/area: vicenza – italy

status: completed, 2008

The 5^th  edition of the Bené expo presents 1300 m² of space dedicated to the Eco-Wellness Resort, curated by Sophia Los. A journey across technologies, materials and settings revolving around environmental sustainability. Core themes were, on the one hand, energy-saving for a more rational source management that respects the environment, while on the other, the use of natural, safe and healthy materials from the construction process onwards, and the creation of a glossary to fully appreciate all the faces of ecology.

Four elements are the protagonists and symbols of the Eco Wellness Resort: water, wood, earth and plants. The journey starts with a large area dedicated to water, dealing with the element combining wellness and ecology in their various forms. Greenery is a constant element throughout, from the bio-lakes in the water section to the ancient fruit sold in the green lounge, a winter garden. Earth is the foundational ingredient of a spa room, The suite results from a thinking process that sees the hotel room as the privileged space for wellness. No longer a box to be filled with furniture, but rather a three-dimensional room split into two levels dividing the living area with the seats and writing desk obtained from a gap in the platform, from the bath and bed area, protected by natural hemp/silk curtains. The futon on the upper level can be moved to the bedroom for a massage, while on the opposite side lies the fitted juniper wood tub. The private oudoor space, complete with vertical garden and greenery, is placed at a similar height. On the lawn, we positioned a wooden one person sauna for outdoor relaxation. 

Organiser and presenter of the talk “Ecologia per Piacere”.

Photos: Carlo Panizzolo

programme: expo displays, design and interiors construction management for the showroom, executive plans for the new office building

client: belflowers Srl

team: sophia los, renza mara calabrese, sabina bonfanti, davide charlie ceccon

collaborators: marta stocco

city/area: pontelongo (PD) – italy

status: completed, 2009 -2016

Belflowers is a company based in Padua specializing in artificial flowers. I designed many exhibition stands for them between 2009 and 2017. Together with architect Sabina Bonfanti, we planned the first editions (2009-2010), creating great lampshades covered with sunflowers, produced by Oltremondano. Sabina curated the logo restyling, choosing the sunflower as the iconic element for the company communication and branding. She arranged autumnal and Christmas panels using flowers.

Many were the theme’s incarnations for the various expos of the sector. In 2015 – for HOMI Milan – I conceived a floral ceiling with flower balls.

In 2011, I designed the new office building with Renza Mara Calabrese, although sadly, the plan never went ahead. The company preferred to renovate the interiors with a light restyling of the existing premises in 2014: for the lobby, I proposed a version of the playful sunflowers theme.

In 2016, Davide Charlie Ceccon collaborated with me in creating a Christmas-themed retail area, where his large scale illustrations gave life to an evocative, spectacular, expressive space.

Stand production: Europstand (Leopoldo Agostini)

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