What begins as destruction can become design. Following the devastating Emilia earthquake of May 2012, which struck Northern Italy and deeply impacted the region’s artisans, Budri, a marble specialist rooted in Modena, transformed fragments of broken slabs into something entirely new. The result is Earthquake 5.9, a monumental furniture and object collection created in collaboration with designer Patricia Urquiola.
Rather than discard the marble and semi-precious stones shattered by the quake, Budri and Urquiola reimagined the debris as raw material. Pieces of onyx, lapis lazuli, amethyst, mother of pearl, and marble, originally deemed unsalvageable, were painstakingly pieced together into bold geometric compositions. The collection includes living tables, vases, bookshelves, wall inlays, and coffee tables, all composed from hundreds of fragments, an elegant tribute to resilience and regeneration.
Each item in the Earthquake 5.9 series is deeply symbolic. The Living Table and Origami side tables, for example, balance clean architectural form with visual chaos, a literal mosaic of disaster reassembled into order. The Tricot Vases, with their intricate marquetry, reference textile patterns while also capturing the care and craftsmanship required to rebind the broken. Meanwhile, the Boiserie wall panels, titled “Knit,” “Purl,” “Cable,” and “Rib,” evoke Eastern decorative arts and traditional weaves, suggesting fragility transformed through cultural memory.
Beyond beauty, Earthquake 5.9 is a manifesto of upcycling and material storytelling. It challenges conventional definitions of waste, proving that what breaks can still serve. It also captures a specific moment in Italian design history, a response not just to a seismic event, but to the spirit of reinvention that followed.
From “Origami Grand Antique” to the “Fishbone” wall inlay, the collection extends across function and form, merging craft with contemporary expression. As Budri states, there is no such thing as leftover, only new possibilities waiting to be designed.
