Tommaso Pestelli
We are in the center of Florence, in Borgo Santi Apostoli in the heart of the city, a few steps away from Ponte Vecchi and from the Uffizi galleries, and he is Tommaso Pestelli goldsmith.
During the Renaissance the link between figurative arts and goldsmiths was very strong and many painters and sculptors of the time began their apprenticeship in the goldsmiths’ workshops: Donatello, Botticelli, Ghirlandaio, Brunelleschi, Ghiberti, are the testimony, without forgetting Benvenuto Cellini.
And it is precisely in one of these workshops that master Tommaso Pestelli works, son of an artist who has reached the fourth generation.
The store was opened by his great-grandfather Edoardo Pestelli in 1908 after having trained at the famous Marchesini jewelry store. The mosaic creations, precious and hard stones, corals and pearls immediately appealed to the bourgeoisie and nobility of that time so that among their customers were, for example, the House of Savoy and the vice king of Egypt.
Generations followed one another in the same art until, in 1989, Tommaso personally created each work, together with his wife Eva Aulmann, a well-known artist in the world of graphic art.
“I grew up in the backroom of the family store among beautiful and refined objects, among designs and samples of a jewelry that reflected the most refined and harmonious taste of a time gone by. I couldn’t help but fall in love with this world and follow in the footsteps of my ancestors, but adding my own …on the road in search of Beauty.”
He trained in his early years (as in the best artisan tradition) with one of the master goldsmiths working for the family business, and then expanded his skills at the Academy of Fine Arts as a sculptor and later at the Opificio delle Pietre Dure in the restoration of gold and glyptics, making him a complete artist in terms of aesthetics, competence and technical knowledge.
And it is thanks to these skills acquired over the years combined with a look always interested in the world around him that unique works are born for imagination, elegance and fine technique.
His ability to transfer “wonder” into the products he makes, turning them into masterpieces.
He loves to finish his creations not only frontally but also in the back, because as in a dress of haute couture excellence is seen in its reverse!
He has received numerous national and international awards including the Talents du Luxe et de la Création, in the Elegance category in Paris, as well as having some of his creations exhibited at the Museo degli Argenti in Florence.
