Vases as tiny architectures shaped through acts of composition
Chiara Lionello’s Inserti is both a vase and a micro-architecture, composed of a ceramic base and an aluminum support: two elements that, in her remarkable design vision, bring together the singular imperfection of craftsmanship and the rigorous perfection of industrial seriality.
“Inserti is a collection of vases designed to inspire everyday gestures of beauty.” Neither merely aesthetic nor purely functional, the projects of Chiara Lionello – Italian architect, designer, and researcher – stem from a practice that places human connection at its core. Based in Milan, Chiara holds a PhD in Architecture obtained between the Politecnico di Milano and the Tokyo Institute of Technology. Today, her practice explores the relational nature of design across different scales.
From spatial projects such as “Wunderkammer” in NoLo, Milan’s artistic district, an apartment conceived to welcome and enhance a constantly evolving collection of objects, to the small Parisian pied-à-terre “Coup de Théâtre”, imagined as a meditative retreat and flexible workspace for an Italian writer. Her work also extends into research and product design, as in Carosello: a bookshelf first and foremost, yet also a micro-architecture capable of hosting clothes, hats, and everyday belongings.
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Chiara creates works conceived to spark something within people: a daily gesture, an emotion slowly resurfacing, or an unexpected shared experience. For her, designing objects or environments means shaping “spaces” of interaction. It is this relational dimension, Chiara believes, that transforms them into companions in everyday life.
Thus, a flower vase can be an extraordinary home adornment, one of the most poetic gestures of welcome, yet also the result of a genuine compositional and aesthetic practice. Such is the case with Inserti, the project by Chiara Lionello that won the main award at EDIT Napoli 2025, now recognized as one of the most important fairs in the world of editorial and authorial design.
Inserti is a micro-architecture, an object that invites interaction and reflection. A vase that finds its completion, and indeed its very function, in the creative gesture itself. Interacting with it does not simply mean filling its hollow; it means initiating one, or countless, acts of composition.
The creative and contemplative act brings cut flowers back to life, much like in the Japanese art of Ikebana. In fact, Chiara’s project draws inspiration precisely from the Japanese aesthetic universe, and in particular from the traditional wooden sake buckets, which were often adorned with flowers during festive occasions. Through its structure, Inserti naturally leads toward a minimal and harmonious floral composition, one that calls for careful selection and a process of synthesis.
What makes possible what Chiara calls “everyday practices of beauty” is the very structure of the vases: the encounter between two elements, ceramic and anodized aluminum, drawn respectively from the worlds of craftsmanship and construction. The container structure is handcrafted by a family of Milanese ceramists and glazed in delicate pastel tones. Its surface reveals small imperfections that not only make each piece inevitably unique but also celebrate, through those irregularities, the artisanal process from which the work originates.
The anodized aluminum – first cut, then perforated to create a rhythmic pattern – serves as a support for the flower stems and gives meaning to the entire project. The holes in the aluminum profiles allow creative thought to materialize in ever-changing compositions, each born from new and different inspirations. Thus, from something that quintessentially represents industrial seriality, uniqueness and even poetry emerges.
To interact with the vases is to witness a project come to life, and it is precisely this relational aspect that elevates the value of the work and opens it to shared experiences. As in the case of EDIT Napoli, the exhibition design reflected perfectly the intention behind the project’s creation. The public, in fact, was invited to take part. A circular pocket embedded in the round surface on which the Inserti vases were displayed held cut flowers, ready to be transformed into compositions, allowing visitors to experiment freely.
Chiara’s vases could almost be described as microcosms that, on a small scale, explore the transformations of contemporary living. The encounter between ceramic and anodized aluminum is not simply an aesthetic or technical choice, but a message in itself. The material warmth, imperfections, and craftsmanship expressed by the ceramic evoke a form of creativity shaped by attempts, intuition, and fleeting inspirations. The precision and rigor of aluminum, by contrast, speak of clarity of intent, the ability to translate inspiration into form, and the awareness inherent in each gesture. The perfect and natural balance between these two realms, the unique and the serial, has contributed to the project’s recognition within the Neapolitan design fair and, clearly, in wider contexts.
