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Through our experience at Alessi, we are well aware of the fact that people buy our coffee makers and kettles not just because they have to make coffee or boil water, but also because of a whole series of other reasons linked to factors that have as much to do with our imagination as they do for their practical and functional purpose. We have no intention of denying the importance of Functional or Practical Value, which can understandably be considered as coinciding with the object’s very raison d’être, justifying its identity as a product. But it is important to remember that, when considering the reasons for the existence of the items around us, there are other values which are just as important as Functional Value.
For example, objects have become the principal channel by means of which we reveal our status and our personality to others (just think of the fashion phenomenon). The possession and use of objects is basically equivalent to an exchange of cultural and social meanings. By choosing those items that will become part of their personal environment, people tend to bestow on them important social significance, using them as motifs to communicate values they consider to be part of themselves, their own distinguishing characteristics. Sociologists refer to this tendency as Status or Style Value: a status symbol could be, for example, a gold Rolex watch, which indicates the economic condition of its wearer; an example of Style Value might be a coffee pot by Aldo Rossi, which can be understood as an indication of cultural sensitivity.
But the question goes even further. There is another value, one that we could define as Poetic Value. We have learnt, from experience, that people also use objects to attempt to satisfy a deeply-rooted desire for art and poetry. The classical instruments which are still used today to express art (museums for paintings and sculpture, books for poetry) are no longer capable of fully meeting this demand. As a result, in contemporary society (and the market) there is a powerful need for art and poetry, and this is something the mass production industry has not yet fully taken on board.
These reflections form an ideal introduction to our first collection of miniatures: a series comprising a number of classics from the last sixty years of our production, from the “Bombé” teapot by Carlo Alessi (1945) to the “Mami” saucepan by Stefano Giovannoni (1999). The collection was created with special consideration for collectors of our products, to give them the chance to complete their private collections of authentic objects and with considerable savings in terms of both space and expenditure.
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