BIOGRAPHY

I am Chiara De Filippis. I was born in Rome, studied humanities, and moved to Florence to learn a trade with my hands.

My training happened in the workshops, over years spent alongside several master goldsmiths, and it carried on through travelling and through trying things at the bench. From 2009 I worked and exhibited as an artist in my own right, in Italy and abroad, finding out what my work was for and who it was for. In 2015 I gave it a name and founded the brand.

I work mainly in 925 sterling silver and 18kt gold. Hand forging with the hammer, which lets me build continuous shapes and minimal volumes without soldering. Keum-boo, an ancient Korean technique I taught myself, where pure 24kt gold is fused into the surface of silver by heat and pressure alone, with no plating and no glue. Florentine engraving. Stone setting, done by hand.

Every piece is made one at a time, so no two are identical. Alongside my own collections, most of my work is made to commission.

My work has travelled. It is stocked at the Design Shop of Palazzo Strozzi in Florence, and it has reached the MAK, the museum of applied arts in Vienna, and the Des Moines Art Center in Iowa. The atelier holds an excellence recognition from OMA, Fondazione CR Firenze.

I also sit on two CNA boards here in Florence. That came out of the way I work rather than the other way round: what interests me is the conversation between artisan tradition, design, and the people who actually walk through the door of a workshop — Florentines and visitors alike. It takes time, which is not how most things are bought now.

The atelier is in Via San Giovanni 13r. Visits are best arranged in advance.