Sure, we could (and do) talk endlessly about the clothes we love, but for our column Line Item, we ask some of our favorite designers to tell us what they think about the best pieces from their newest collections. Today, Matteo Martignoni of Aesop talks to us about the Sonority Gift Kit, a really great holiday gift.
This year, our seasonal Gift Kits were inspired by the Italian Futurist movement of the early 20th century. The Futurists were a group of dreamers of the early 1900s, who glorified the energy and speed of modern life together with the dynamism and violence of the new technological society. They're cool to us because they were cultural revolutionaries. To audiences of the time, their work was provocative in the extreme. It shook sensibilities. Their typographical innovations appealed to us, too. To challenge conventional book design and content, Futurism founder Filippo Tommaso Marinetti's writing was as much a visual art as a literary one.
Our take on Futurism enhances the obscure cultural side of Aesop, kits’ titles and artwork take their cues from works such as Zang Tumb Tumb, Marinetti’s famous longform poem based on his experiences during the Battle of Adrianopolos (Turkey) in 1912. The kits are six acts of our declaration of love to those mad, naif and heroic revolutionaries. We've been passionate with this project for the last 10 months, paying our homage to these enlightened minds. Citing Marinetti’s Futurism Manifesto, "We had stayed up all night, my friends and I, under hanging mosque lamps with domes of filigreed brass, domes starred like our spirits, shining like them with the prisoned radiance of electric hearts."
The Sonority kit features our Resurrection Aromatique Hand Wash and Hand Balm, Geranium Leaf Body Cleanser and Rind Concentrate Body Balm.
Radiant Electric Heart from Aesop on Vimeo.