Hey kids, let's produce a bathtub in the shape of a shoe and sell boatloads of tile in the process.
So it started last week. Nick Lovelady is one of my Twitter friends and he tweets under the alias @cupboards . He threw a link up on Twitter and challenged me to write something scathing about what he dubbed drag queen bathtubs. Here are a couple of images of the tubs in question.
Nick's drag queen bathtubs sprouted legs and earlier than too lengthy there had been among five or six humans batting snarky remarks backward and forward approximately them. Nick became insistent that I write something and I agreed that I would if he did. Then I upped the pressure a chunk and demanded that everybody who became buying and selling barbs approximately it last Thursday cope with this stuff in their blogs today. As the day goes on these days, I'll post links to anybody else's tackle these things at the lowest of this publish. I have a feeling that everyone else will me guffawing about them. I thought it via and I think the comic story's on us.
At first I was appalled but then I read the accompanying article . It turns out that these are real tubs but the kicker is that they're produced by Sicis . Sicis is an Italian mosaic tile company, in my mind they are the Italian mosaic tile company. Sicis is the Ravenna-based producer of some of the finest (and most expensive) glass tile on the planet . Their primary product are small-scale tiles and they're available in a color palette that's so expansive it's difficult to describe adequately.
As brilliant because the exceptional of the shade is, in which Sicis surely shines is as an incubator of ideas. Sicis does everything it could to allow tremendous designers to head nuts with Sicis tile. And go nuts they do. Here's a number of what I mean.
I can't imagine some other producer pulling this off.
I don't doubt for a 2nd that Sicis will promote you one those tubs. They will promote you one of these mannequins too. But some thing tells me that within the private bowels of that manufacturing facility in Ravenna, nobody's pinning their hopes on you or all people else buying a mosaic bath inside the form of a shoe. What Sicis need from those tubs is for people to talk about them and to talk about Sicis at the same time. So within the case of this blog post, I performed right into their hand. I'm satisfied to do it too. Sicis makes remarkable stuff and the way they sell additionally it is as compelling because the stuff itself.
Sicis has a new showroom at the corner of Broome and Green Streets in New York. It is the St. Peter's Basilica of mosaic tile.
No trip to New York could be considered complete without a stop there. Their neighborhood in Soho is crammed with such notable neighbors as Waterworks, Kartell, Artemide, Luceplan and their primary competitors, Bisazza. Get thee to Soho!
So after all that, we're back to the tubs. How clever is it that a company in Ravenna can encourage a designer to develop an absurd bathtub and in reaction to it, a bunch of other designers would start talking about it on Twitter. Less then a week later, all of those designers would talk about those tubs on their blogs. I think that's what we call viral marketing. Sicis spent a couple thousand euros on an absurd tub and as a result of that, they're going to sell a boatload of tile.
Since this post is a part of a famous rebellion on Twitter, here ae the rest of the first-class those who are weighing in in this weighty problem today. Check 'em out.
Always game Becky Shankle: Eco-Modernism is her blog, @ecomod is her Twitter handle
Innocent bystander Alexandra Williams: Fun and Fit is her blog, @Alexandrafunfit is her Twitter handle
Chief instigator Nick Lovelady: Cupboards is his blog, @cupboards is his Twitter handle
Guilty bystander Bill Buyok: AventeTile Talk is his blog, @AventeTileis his Twitter handle
Puppet master Rufus Dogg, AKC, PhD, DS: Dog Walk Blog is his blog, @dogwalkblog is his Twitter handle
The divine Madame Sunday: Modern Sauce is her blog, @ModernSauce is her Twitter handle