MAKERS | EUROPE | ITALY | METALWORK
Percossi Papi | Jewellers
Since 1968, the Rome-based family-run atelier, Percossi Papi, has crafted beautiful, decorative jewellery inspired by ancient designs and traditional techniques. Sara Pierdonà speaks to Valeria Percossi - whose father started the business - to discover the family's story and their painstaking, patient process, where crafting one single earring can take up to 20 hours of meticulous work.
How did you begin?
"Percossi Papi was founded by my father. The context was the somewhat restless Rome of the 1970s, with the hippies who had invaded Piazza Navona selling their creations and ethnic trinkets. My father had studied architecture and was a great connoisseur of classical culture. He transferred these notions into sculptures made of copper, which bore little resemblance to what he would later do in goldsmithing.
"These were mostly masks made entirely of metal, and it was the customers who suggested that he enrich them with enamels, wanting additions of colour. This was the first step towards the discovery of cloisonné, a then unfashionable and almost forgotten technique, which was to become Percossi Papi's trademark."
How did you learn?
"My father's grandfather had been a diamond carver in Antwerp, but the trade had skipped a generation, and so he found himself learning everything. He started with simple things, which gradually became more and more baroque and complex even in the inclusion of stones. For his part, he was extremely good at passing on knowledge: he brought me and my brother up immersed 'in the art' from a young age, making us absorb what we needed spontaneously.
"In his initial experiments, his background as an architect and sculptor obviously played in his favor, because it gave him the confidence of volumes. And I think the fact that he was self-taught made him freer: the lack of a formal education spared him from following rules whose existence he was, in fact, unaware of."
How do you plan, prepare and create?
"My father is mainly in charge of custom-made jewellery, while my brother and I design our collections. The first step is the drawing, and it is strictly a full-scale technical drawing. This also helps the client (when the object is custom-made) to imagine the finished result.
"This is followed by the typical steps of the cloisonné, used by ancient Egyptians, Lombards and Byzantines: a flat metal sheet is made into strips, which are soldered perpendicularly on another sheet following the drawing; the jewel is pierced and cut out with the bow; then the piece is cleaned and sanded, an operation that takes place in three steps. The penultimate step is gilding, and only at this point do we get to the enamels, which are inserted into the profiles using tiny needles. A single earring can take up to 20 hours of work."
Who or what most influences your work?
"It is often the material chosen that dictates the use. Each stone has specific characteristics (hardness, colour, transparency, etc.) that recall certain shapes or dimensions...with experience it becomes a very natural process. Lapis lazuli, for example, has a vivid colour, and it is spontaneous to put it in dialectic with other colours. Rock crystal, on the other hand, is transparent and imposes more ethereal and dreamy lines and combinations."
Percossi Papi Amethyst and Blue Earrings
Percossi Papi Topaz Earrings
Percossi Papi Citrine Earrings
Percossi Papi Amethyst and Green Earrings
What does a typical day look like?
"Our workshops have never moved from the centre of Rome. But of course they have expanded! The thing we are most proud of is the team of craftsmen who work in our workshop, a sort of 'extended family'. It takes a minimum of three years to train a craftsman capable of making complex jewellery pieces."
One More Thing… A Place or Space that really inspires you?
"What I have noticed unconsciously leaking out of both my own and my father's designs is the joy of Mediterranean culture. I find that the colors and exuberance of our jewellery echo places like Capri or Istanbul - two places close to my heart."
Interview by Sara Pierdonà
Images from Percossi Papi
EXPLORE THE ATLAS
