#07085 SAINT JOSEPH (RE-DECO)
#07087 BABY JESUS (RE-DECO)
#07086 MARY (RE-DECO)
Sunday, November 11, 2012
Thursday, October 18, 2012
FRAGILE BEAUTIES
Rosa Lladró talks about the international porcelain brand’s range of Indian sculptures and its line-up for the forthcoming festive season
Rosa Lladró, president of Lladró, the celebrated Spanish luxury porcelain brand, recently unveiled Lladró’s limited edition Goddess Lakshmi sculptures in the city. In an email interview, she shares her thoughts on Lladró’s 12-year presence in India, the intricacies involved in making the sculptures and the ‘Spirit of India’ collection.
What inspires you most about India?
India is an extremely fascinating land, so colourful and full of life. Every time I visit this country I fall in love with the hospitality. Indians have always been in tune with their heritage and culture. There are many Indias within India, that’s how vast the culture is. This is my first visit to Chennai — to unveil and sign the Goddess Lakshmi sculptures — and it has been a great experience for me.
What is your favourite Indian design (in Lladró)?
The set of Ganeshas made by Raul Rubio, from ‘The Spirit of India’ collection.
Is there a Lladró collector’s club in the country?
Yes, we do have a Lladró Gold Club, which is an online club exclusively for Lladró’s best customers and collectors. Members receive direct communication and have access to limited edition sculptures at special introductory prices. Apart from this, they get insurance against breakage covering 100 per cent of the price of any Lladró sculpture (during the first year of purchase). Lladró Gold Club members also receive special and personalised treatment on visiting Valencia and The City of Porcelain.
How should one take care/ maintain these fragile beauties?
Plain water and neutral soap can be used to clean Lladró pieces. Lladró also offers after-sale services, where a team goes to the client’s house / office and cleans the sculpture for them. We also assist customers with their Lladró sculptures, when they shift houses. On special occasions, we also offer gift packaging and festive platters.
Duplicates are often the bane of any high-end luxury product. How does Lladró keep on top of this problem?
Lladró sculptures are manufactured traditionally, employing a long, complex process. Every Lladró sculpture is completely hand-made by skilled artisans at one single factory at Valencia. The porcelain, moulds and colours are also made in Valencia. Using age-old furnaces, we follow 16-steps to create a sculpture; and sometimes, it can take as long as five years to create a new one. This art is unique to Lladró. Hence, it’s very difficult to copy a Lladró sculpture. The quality that a Lladró piece delivers cannot be duplicated.
Does Lladró have anything special to offer this festive season?
Lladró will continue working around the Indian culture and its traditions. In fact, we’re working on two projects — Lakshman and Hanuman — inspired by the Hindu iconography. We are also coming out with sculptures of Sai Baba, and we’ve recently launched Goddess Lakshmi, a limited edition of 720 pieces.
What has been your experience, selling in India?
The Indian market has been extremely warm towards Lladró. The brand entered the country in the year 2000. Since then we have been growing every year. New products/sculptures are made available across our stores here, as they are globally. Signing and sculptor events are held on a regular basis to strengthen our bond with the Indian consumer. In my opinion all our customers come to us for sentimental reason. When they buy a sculpture at Lladró it is purely because of the beauty of the product and the happy feelings our sculpture translate.
APARNA KARTHIKEYAN
THE HINDU
September 28, 2012
Lladro from Spain - Montinas
Tuesday, October 02, 2012
Lladro 12549 WHISPERS FROM THE SEA
Issue Year: 2012
Sculptor: José Luis Santes
Size: 47x32 cm
Gres
Lladro from Spain - Montinas
Thursday, September 20, 2012
Tuesday, September 18, 2012
Lladro Oriental Vases
Issue Year: 2012
Sculptor: Dpto. Ornamentación
Size: 54x26 cm
Base included
Limited Edition 250 pieces
Issue Year: 2012
Sculptor: Dpto. Ornamentación
Size: 54x26 cm
Base included
Limited Edition 250 pieces
Lladro from Spain - Montinas
Lladro New Issues 2012
Icons of Christianity, collections featuring sacred animals, lithophane votive lights with spiritual messages and oriental vases are joining more recognizable pieces in Lladro's second introductions of new issues for 2012.
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
Sexy Spanish Surrealism at New Tribeca Grand Lounge
The Winka Dubbeldam-designed bar doubles
as a showroom for Spanish furnishings.
BY SUZANNE LABARRE
JUNE 10, 2010
A new lounge bar in a downtown Manhattan hotel doubles as a showroom for Spanish design, producing an ultra-sexy environment that owes more to Salvador Dalí than to hokey taprooms.
Salon features work by 16 Spanish blue-chip manufacturers, from Nani Marquina to Lladró. Freshly installed at the Tribeca Grand last month, it was dreamed up by Surface magazine and designed by the New York architect Winka Dubbeldam, who drew her inspiration from Spanish surrealism. "Creating an air of mystique and allure was key," she said. And you can't have "mystique and allure" without Dalí's lip sofas. A pair anchors the main seating area (pictured above).
That's a Nani Marquina rug under the bar.
Tres Tintas's neutral-toned wallpaper makes for a soothing backdrop to Lladró's faintly creepy porcelain figurines.
The lounge is a symphony in black. A nod to the locals, maybe.
Sunday, August 19, 2012
Monday, July 09, 2012
Art of Life
Spanish sculptor embarks on a creative journey
Art doesn't just imitate life. It inspires ideas, imparts values, narrates stories and turns you into a believer. The art that comes closest to human emotions is that of sculptures; sometimes evoking sacredness in places of worship and at other times keeping the spirits of ancestors alive. The emotional energy woven into the medium is such that people attach strong meanings even to the carefully carved and chiselled curios adorning their living rooms.
In 1953, Valencia's Juan, Jose and Vincente Lladro realised the worth of such meaning and set sale on an artistic voyage, one that's going strong even today. Employees of a regular tile and crockery factory, they decided to set up a traditional moorish furnace in their house and soon after, brought to life their first priceless porcelain.
Inspired by former artisans Meissen, Sevres and Capodimonte, their designs began to garner mass appeal. Today, their immaculate creations embody a rarefied worth that equals luxury. This has found them a spot in coveted museums like the Hermitage of St Petersberg in Russia, The Brussels Cinquantanaire Museum and the International Ceramic Museum of Faenza in Italy.
In 1953, Valencia's Juan, Jose and Vincente Lladro realised the worth of such meaning and set sale on an artistic voyage, one that's going strong even today. Employees of a regular tile and crockery factory, they decided to set up a traditional moorish furnace in their house and soon after, brought to life their first priceless porcelain.
Inspired by former artisans Meissen, Sevres and Capodimonte, their designs began to garner mass appeal. Today, their immaculate creations embody a rarefied worth that equals luxury. This has found them a spot in coveted museums like the Hermitage of St Petersberg in Russia, The Brussels Cinquantanaire Museum and the International Ceramic Museum of Faenza in Italy.
Raul Rubio, Sculptor, Lladro
This is the modelling process and is practised to offer an insight into details, textures and motives that will ultimately define the final product.
This is followed by the mould elaboration wherein the plaster is divided into as many fragments as necessary for the work to be reproduced in porcelain. To fine quality porcelain, Lladro sources the purest minerals in the best seams from around the world. This consists of kaolinite, quartz and feldspar. From each of the resulting fragments, a mould is obtained and filled with liquid porcelain paste in order to create the different parts of the figurine.
This limited edition Ganesha is one of Raul's latest designs
The pieces are then sent to the kiln for an entire day and fired till they reach 1,300» C and are then left to cool down. It is during this process that the material transforms to a semiliquid state and one can frequently hear artists saying that porcelain is "alive". The kiln is the ultimate decider of whether the piece has been successfully elaborated or not. Based on that, it's given a final go-ahead for its development.
It is a misconception that all porcelain pieces are glazed; there are sculptures which are made in matt porcelain, or Gres, which are not lustrous. At Lladro, there is a special department for adding colours. Once the signature pastel tones are infused into the material, a layer of varnish is added to lend a crystalline finish.
The real challenge of the game lies in working on symbols of mythology, especially those that are of reverence to other cultures. I have designed the Ramayana quartet which includes Ram & Sita, Hanumaan and Lakshmana. Apart from this, there is also a series of four Ganeshas, one each with a veena, mridangam, bansuri and dancing. Above all, these are deities and their presence invokes awe, which is why details like postures, expressions and embellishments are strictly adhered to. We spend hours reading up on Hinduism and ancient traditions before coming out with these symbols of religiosity.
So, the next time you lay your hands on a porcelain piece, think of its mystical journey from form to content.
Saturday, July 07, 2012
The festival of San Fermín in the city of Pamplona, is a deeply rooted celebration held annually from 12:00, 6 July, when the opening of the fiesta is marked by setting off the pyrotechnic chupinazo, to midnight 14 July, with the singing of the Pobre de Mí. While its most famous event is the encierro, or the running of the bulls, which happens at 8:00 am from July 7th to July 14th, the week long celebration involves many other traditional and folkloric events. It is known locally as Sanfermines and is held in honor of Saint Fermin, the co-patron of Navarre.
Lladro from Spain - Montinas
Wednesday, July 04, 2012
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Friday, May 18, 2012
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
Friday, March 09, 2012
Lladro 08638 Elegant Foxtrot (L.E.)
Lladro Elegant Foxtrot
Size: 14.75 inches tall x 14.5 inches wide
Limited edition of 3000 units
Issue Year 2012
Size: 14.75 inches tall x 14.5 inches wide
Limited edition of 3000 units
Issue Year 2012
Lladro from Spain - Montinas
Thursday, March 01, 2012
Lladro #08639 CHINESE BEAUTY (L.E.)
Lladro #08639 CHINESE BEAUTY (L.E.)
Issue Year: 2012
Sculptor: José Luis Santes
Size: 52x28 cm
Limited Edition 3000 pieces
Gold Club
EXCLUSIVE TO PRIVILEGE GOLD MEMBERS
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
2012 Annual Piece
01008645 " MY PLAYFUL PET "
Issue
Year: 2012
Sculptor: Juan Ignacio Aliena
Size: 17x21 cm
Lladró
celebrates the arrival of warm spring days with the sparkle and fun of My
playful pet, the Annual Piece for 2012. Every detail in this charming figurine
is treated with great care combining expressiveness with the meticulous
craftsmanship Lladró is renowned for. Available in limited quantities until
December 31, you can now acquire this exclusive creation on lladro.com, at
Lladró Boutiques or at any of our Lladró Authorized Retailers.
Lladro from Spain - Montinas
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
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