Patricia Urquiola is one of the most influential figures in the contemporary international design scene. Born in 1961 in Oviedo, Spain, she studied architecture in Madrid before moving to Milan, where she worked under industry designer Achille Castiglioni. Now a multiple-award-winning designer, she lives in Milan, where she opened her own studio for product design, architecture, installations and concept creation in 2001.
A large number of prominent Italian manufacturers rely on her ser vices, the list of their names almost documenting the whole of the history of design: Agape, Alessi, B&B Italia, Cappellini and DePadova, Driade, Foscarini, Flos, Kartell and Moroso. She is renowned for a style based on comfort, elegance and clean lines, but her work is also rich in poetic detail.
For the Rosenthal studioline, Patricia Urquiola created the last of tableware sets the company commissioned. With her wide ranging ideas for Landscape (which includes porcelain, glass, cutlery and textiles), Urquiola offered a contemporary take on the notion of the "set table". Landscape (2008), which took the designer a total of two years, won the Good Design Award from The Chicago Atheneum – Museum of Architecture and Design as well as the Red Dot Design Award.
Landscape features deeply textured relief work that lend the porcelain a fine and translucent effect, as if modeled on Chinese rice china. The decors created for the set are also reminiscent of traditional lace, such as has been hand-woven for centuries in Spain. For both Urquiola and Rosenthal, Landscape represented a challenge, requiring perfect craftsmanship and absolutely superlative technical production facilities.