The historic Milanese apartment and workshop of Laboratorio Paravicini's creative founder
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Set on a cobbled street in the historic heart of Milan, Laboratorio Paravicini is easy to miss until you step inside what was once the stable yard of a Neoclassical building. Run by Costanza Paravicini and her three daughters – Benedetta, Margherita and Bona Medici di Marignano – the ceramics workshop is a place where history and creativity mingle with the scent of clay and the hush of concentration. A series of small but utterly charming rooms wrap around the courtyard, their bare concrete walls lined with kaleidoscopic plates. The hand-painted pieces are made with remarkable precision – a labour of love that can take many hours.
The business was born of serendipity in the early 1990s. Costanza, who trained in art and graphic design before raising her family, had taken on a small studio to draw and paint. Then inspiration struck. ‘I was looking for a set of plates, but all the dinner services I found looked overdone, so I decided to paint one,’ Costanza recalls. ‘Little by little, I became passionate about it.’ The path, however, wasn't easy. ‘I had to learn everything from scratch; it took two years of trial and error before I reached a level I was happy with,’ she adds, revealing how her own dining table became the testing ground.
The home she shares with her husband is on the top floor of an ancient palazzo just a few streets from the workshop. Designed by Italian architect Marco Zanuso in the 1940s, the apartment has an easy, lived-in grace. ‘We wanted this place to reflect us completely,’ Costanza says, describing how she decorated the flat by mixing family furniture and artworks with flea market finds and the occasional new design piece. ‘It's more of a cosy nest than a place to entertain,’ she continues with a radiant smile. ‘At the weekends, we usually escape to the countryside, but this is where I truly feel at home.’
Colour sets the mood throughout, with Costanza embracing the idea that stronger hues ‘work best in small rooms, while in larger spaces it's better to go for lighter and neutral tones.’ She designed the diminutive kitchen herself, giving it a country feel with cabinetry painted in a creamy white and rich mustard yellow. A more vibrant tone provides a joyful backdrop in the nearby dining room for a collection of 18th-century family plates and portraits in pastel. ‘I wanted this space to feel warm and welcoming, not minimal,’ she notes.
This spirit of making a space feel deeply personal and inviting infuses Laboratorio Paravicini. It is now a bustling enterprise, with Costanza and a team of six decorators creating exquisite plates and dinner services, most of them bespoke commissions. Inspiration, as Costanza puts it, ‘can come from anywhere.’ Though experience helps a great deal when it comes to choosing the right motif for each client: ‘Often we move straight to working on the ceramic itself, because a drawing alone doesn't convey the reality of a plate.’
Costanza explains that her decision to use ceramic as the support was initially accidental since, in the early days, ‘it was easier to find ceramic production than artisan porcelain.’ It soon became an aesthetic conviction, shaped by the honesty of the material. ‘Porcelain is decorated above the glaze and always has a slightly precious quality that I didn't want,’ she explains. ‘Working on the ceramic biscuit before glazing allows the decoration to become part of the material. It's more durable and has a particular feel, similar to old pieces that were never uniform and often showed charming irregularities.’
Alongside commissions, Laboratorio Paravicini produces collections that range from traditional motifs to playful and contemporary designs. They create a new collection annually, and at Salone del Mobile this April they're launching a dinner service created in collaboration with the Colombian-Italian metalwork designer Natalia Criado.
Today, Laboratorio Paravicini is truly a family affair. ‘All three of my daughters work with me and each has brought something different to the workshop: Benedetta from design, Margherita from fashion and Bona from events,’ says Costanza. Their combined talents have allowed the business to evolve, but not at the expense of what makes the workshop special – the combination of local heritage and familial bonds. For Costanza, this is what matters most. ‘The table is where family and friends gather to share stories and shape memories,’ she reflects. ‘When I see the plates we make here, I like the idea that they become part of these stories.’
Giulio Ghirardi1/12Costanza’s apartment occupies the top floor of a palazzo not far from the workshop, to which she enjoys commuting by bike. In the narrow entrance corridor, skylights added by postwar architect Marco Zanuso bring natural light into what would otherwise have been a dark space. On the console table, a collection of hardstone spheres gathered over a lifetime by her father reflects the decorating spirit that informs the whole apartment – a mix of family pieces and finds. ‘We wanted this place to reflect us completely.’
Giulio Ghirardi2/12Costanza designed the kitchen herself, transforming what was once a dark, enclosed space by opening up the roof to let in light. The result has a distinct country feel – warm mustard cabinetry, a lived-in ease – that she carried through into the adjoining dining room. On the table, a set of plates from Laboratorio Paravicini’s Rocaille collection in blue.
Giulio Ghirardi3/12A joyful yellow wraps the dining room walls, setting a warm backdrop for a collection of 18th-century family plates arranged in the manner of a private cabinet. Hand-turned pearwood lamps and an early 20th-century centre-table lamp complete a space that feels as though it has always looked exactly like this.
Giulio Ghirardi4/12An 18th-century pastel portrait surveys the dining room from the wall – one of several family pieces that give the apartment its sense of accumulated, unhurried history. The deep yellow walls were a deliberate choice. ‘In smaller spaces you can use stronger colours,’ says Costanza. ‘In larger rooms it's better to stick with lighter, neutral tones.’
Giulio Ghirardi5/12Costanza sets the table with the Rocaille dinner service in pink, one of Laboratorio Paravicini’s signature collections. ‘It’s like painting with watercolours, but on a rough, absorbent surface,’ she says of the hand-decoration process. ‘Once decorated, the plate can't even be touched by hand.’
Giulio Ghirardi6/12Costanza and her daughter Margherita at the table – the setting that, more than anywhere else, lies at the heart of what Laboratorio Paravicini is really about.
Giulio Ghirardi7/12A gold screen print by artist Paolo Calcagni catches the eye in a corner of the living room – made from an old photograph of Costanza during a sailing trip, one of her great passions. Look closely and you'll find her. ‘It holds a special place in my memory,’ she laughs. ‘You can barely recognise me at first – there was an incredible wind that day.’
Giulio Ghirardi8/12A cabinet tucked into an awkward corner where the roof beams meet the walls has been cleverly turned into a bar, its interior lined in toile de jouy wallpaper. A characterful solution to an unlikely space. ‘We never turned to a decorator,’ says Costanza. ‘We wanted it to remain a warm, lived-in space.
Giulio Ghirardi9/12The bedroom walls are hung with family photographs and travel watercolours collected over the years – an intimate gallery that shifts in mood with the light. ‘It’s a blue with a warm, rosy undertone,’ says Costanza of the wall colour, ‘that changes a lot depending on the light.’
Giulio Ghirardi10/12Viewed from the bedroom doorway, the living room unfolds beneath the eaves. Above a green sofa, two large still life paintings anchor the walls. A 19th-century notary's desk with its original leather top completes the scene.
Giulio Ghirardi11/12Costanza in her workshop, where she has spent more than three decades perfecting the art of painted ceramic plates. ‘Inspiration can come from anywhere,’ she says. ‘Years of experience help – but that’s true of anything worth doing.’
Giulio Ghirardi12/12A work in progress from Laboratorio Paravicini's latest collaboration – a dinner service created with Colombian-Italian metalwork designer Natalia Criado, launched at this April’s Salone del Mobile. Costanza’s calligraphic brushstrokes interpret Criado’s minimalist aesthetic, weaving it into the workshop's delicate decorative language.
