Nowadays, high-end furniture is not all about wood – it’s usually a mix of several materials. Various metals, such as copper, bronze, aluminum, stainless steel, cast iron and others, are routinely combined with wood in modern furniture production.
Pretty often these details are made of so-called “Red Metals” – brass, bronze, and copper. Stainless steel, aluminum, iron, and other metals and alloys are also used in fashionable furniture making.
Well whatever material is used, a gifted designer can use it to the best advantage. Bellavista Collection – a company renowned for its selection of Italian luxury furniture – is lucky to have a genius of a designer. For many years Attilio Zanni has been creating impressive designs for pieces of furniture, lighting fixtures, elements for interior decoration, and wall panelling. This brilliant designer makes the most of a wide range of materials, including metals.
Beautiful, Strong, and Long-lasting
Copper, brass, and bronze are among the favorites in Bellavista Collection. Although they are called ‘Red metals’, just one of these three – copper – is a metal with a color that with great reserve could be called red (pure copper is of pinkish-orange color). Copper is a relatively soft, malleable, highly versatile, and corrosion resistant metal, which has been valued and used since ancient times.
The other two – bronze and brass – are actually alloys, i.e. mixtures of copper with other chemical elements. Chemists call alloys solid solutions, because atoms of metals in alloys are intermingled in the same way as, say, salt and water in a liquid solution.
Brass consists mostly of copper and zinc, while bronze – mostly of copper and tin. ‘Mostly’ means that along with two basic components, there are other elements present there in lesser amounts, such as arsenic, phosphorus, aluminum, manganese, nickel, silicon and others. Depending on chemical composition, there are various kinds of brass and bronze, which differ in their properties.
Foundrymen from Bellavista love red metals. Copper, brass, and bronze look gorgeous and are relatively easy to work with. Melting points of brass and bronze are 900 and 950 degrees centigrade respectively, which is much lower than iron and steel. As for copper, it melts at a bit higher temperature – 1085 °C. Thus, all three are relatively easy to cast.
Aluminum and stainless steel are two more materials Bellavista’s masters make use of.
Stainless steel is a steel alloy, which contains at least 10.5% of chromium. Adding molybdenum further increases corrosion resistance. Strong, resistant to corrosion and staining, easy-care and good-looking, stainless steel is a perfect material for many applications, including modern furniture making.
Aluminum is a lightweight and ductile metal of silvery-white color, which melts at 660.32 °C and can form hard yet light alloys with other metals. Its outstanding corrosion resistance and very good strength and hardness paved its way to a great variety of uses.
Stylish and Modern-Looking
21st century gives furniture designers wonderful opportunities when it comes to non-wood materials and methods of their processing. Metals are among the most rewarding materials for making high-end designer furniture. Let’s take a look at a few Bellavista’s furniture pieces made solely of metals.
If you open ‘Tables’ category and proceed to ‘Coffee and Side Tables sub-category’, you will instantly notice a side table HOLE that looks out of the ordinary indeed. Its cylinder-like shape with a hole in it instantly turns heads. HOLE isn’t large – just 50 centimeters (19.7 inches) high and 50 centimeters in diameter. This table is available in three color options: brushed stainless steel, antique bronze, and matt black nickel.
The name of one more metal table – COPPER – is pretty self-explanatory. It is made of blackened copper with shiny protective varnish. The table is and available in two sizes: 30 cm (11.8 inches) high and 50 cm (19.7 in) high. Other dimensions are 180 x 90 cm. (70.9 x 35.4 in.) and 60 x 60 cm. (23.6 in.) respectively.
The three-legged round table named BATISTA is one more example of what Bellavista’s masters can make out of metals. BATISTA is 50 cm. (19.7 in) high and 30 cm. (11.8 in) in diameter; it can be made of cast brass or cast aluminum.
As for finishes, there are four of them available. For cast brass structure, it’s black patina with edges details in polished brass; if the structure is of cast aluminum, there are three options to choose from: Batista Black, Batista Copper, and Batista Silver.
If your tastes in furniture design include modest lines and uncommon materials, take a look at STEWART, a copper console table. A rectangular console, 60 centimeters (23.6 in.) high, 240 centimeters (94.5 inches) long and 40 centimeters (15.7 in.) wide is made of blackened copper with polished protective varnish (brandy finish).
A Perfect Match of Materials
Along with all-metal items, Bellavista Collection has lots of furniture items which demonstrate happy blend of wood and metal. For example, many Bellavista tables have tabletops made of wood or natural stone combined with metal legs, bases, and frames. The end result looks impressive indeed.
One more console table, CONSOLA, is available in a great many combinations. Two options – antique bronze or polished black nickel – for its legs plus as many as twelve kinds of wood for the top result in plenty of choices.
A dining table TULIPE and a coffee table called TULIPE LOW have impressively-looking legs made of hammered antique brass – and striking selection of materials for their tops. If you pick TULIPE LOW, be prepared to choose among sixteen options of wood and marble! As for TULIPE, ten kinds of wood for the tabletop and three more variants for its optional marble inset will make you to experience the real agonies of choosing.
Combining materials for a striking result – that’s what professionals from Bellavista Collection are well-versed in. You can see it for yourself – just browse through any product category of Bellavista’s website.
