Officine Nora: Preciousness in human relationships
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After visiting Officine Nora, the feeling that pervaded me was of an open, free and independent place. Officine Nora is a co-working for jewellery makers and a jewellery shop based in Florence writes Ilaria Ruggiero.
It was started in 2014 by the Florentine jewellery designer Margherita de Martino Norante that, after graduating at Alchimia Contemporary Jewellery School, wanted to preserve the practice of comparing ideas and techniques with other jewellery makers in a collaborative and lively environment.
A place of creation therefore, but without preconceptions or ideologies.
A laboratory certainly directed by professional artists, but especially a space for sharing ideas and researches among more or less established, both passing or resident, jewellery artists, to develop projects, or even simply to work a few hours a week.
Strengthened by the historical tradition that links the city of Florence with the goldsmith's art, Officine Nora wants to be a response to the current needs of those who today want to develop this profession and take their first steps in this sector, with the great difficulties of the case.
Officine Nora hosts 11 working benches, all the main jewellery tools and machinery. It also has a shop area. Young jewellery makers can rent an equipped bench and start working on their own without being alone while more experienced artists can keep growing and making new connections.
It promotes the encounter between artists with different professionalism and maturity, precisely because it believes in the value of the exchange, of the network and of sharing, as a true element of preciousness, inherent human relationships.
There are artists coming from all over the world, from the States to Japan, South Africa, Taiwan and this mix of tastes, skills, approaches is always mind-opening.
Not just courses, rental benches, sharing and consulting, but also shop and exhibition space.
Officine Nora is that injection of fresh energy that the field of contemporary jewellery needs and that can give real and current answers to the decline of our tradition, heritage and experience, particularly in historical cities, which pretend to be the flagship of the past, but that often are not able to lead it properly into the future.
Officine Nora
Via dei Preti 2-4/red
50125 Florence
Italy
About the Contributing Writer
Ilaria Ruggiero is a cultural manager and curator working in the field of contemporary art. She is the founder of Adornment - Curating Contemporary Art Jewelry, a curatorial integrated project dedicated to contemporary art jewelry. It aims to develop the knowledge and consciousness of contemporary jewelry as artistic discipline and as ground search for technique, aesthetics, and philosophy.
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