Maurizio Riva, an intriguing figure, was the speaker at the convivial meeting on September 8. He defines himself as a “woodworker,” but a “woodworker” who is President of a company that is a unique Italian reality and exports its products worldwide.
The company was founded in 1920 and has expanded over the years to the current third generation (the speaker), with the fourth already operational (his children) and the fifth in professional development (a 15-year-old grandchild). Three factories at zero kilometers and the Riva Center, which houses a 1,200 square meter showroom and the Wood Museum on the first floor. Sustainability, design, research, and cultural projects are fundamental parts of the company’s activities, with the enhancement of natural wood and manual craftsmanship as its distinctive features.
Incredible is the capacity to reuse woods such as the millennial Kauri from New Zealand (wood preserved for millennia in a sort of natural hibernation and recovered in trunks 70 meters long), the Briccole from the Venice Lagoon (which mark low tide and are periodically replaced, made unique by the work of small mollusks), the Cedar of Lebanon with its unmistakable fragrance. But also the barrels from San Patrignano, which were discarded due to wear at a rate of up to 200 per year, but instead recovered for design objects, thus giving the wood a third life and the Community valuable financial income. A man of multiple interests, collaborator and friend of international architects (Renzo Piano, Mario Botta, Matteo Thun, to name a few), friend of various figures from culture and entertainment whom he periodically invites to give presentations, creator together with Pininfarina of the Wooden Machine presented at the 2012 Furniture Fair, promoter of the Pangea table designed by architect De Lucchi and presented at Expo 2015, close to the world of young people with the motto: “Order equals quality of work.” At the conclusion of the evening, a wooden heart was presented to the ladies and guests received a spinning top made from millennial wood that spins and stands back up, symbolizing humanity’s capacity to progress through difficulties. We are all invited to the Wood Festival 2022 in Cantù from November 12 to 20.
L.F.
