Natsuko Toyofuku
Born in Tokyo in 1956 from a family of artists, she arrived in Milan as a child and, in the Eighties, started her journey in the world of jewellery.
Thanks to the influence of her parents, both important artists, from the very beginning Natsuko was inspired to think outside the box, experimenting with unusual materials and innovative techniques, employing for instance the “magic pearl”, a typical Japanese gemstone, as well as unusual and less valuable materials such as bronze and copper, mainly applying the lost wax technique, combined with glass, wood, semiprecious stones and corals. She draws inspiration primarily from fauna and flora, which she re-interprets in sinuous and sleek decorations, and spiral-shaped and naturalistic patterns. After a long experience in a workshop, in 2009 she opened her own atelier, located inside a charming palace’s courtyard in Corso Como, Milan. Here you can find all of her precious creations, her table-sculptures and hanging creations.
Each piece is the result of a cultural mix: on one hand, traditional Italian high-craftsmanship, and on the other, Oriental shapes and echoes inspired by Natsuko’s heritage. Each creation is crafted with great expertise and care, processed and finished by hand, so as to give each item a distinctive uniqueness: thus, even within a limited series, each jewel will never be identical to the previous one. In her most recent pieces, Natsuko combined bronze, her favourite material, with colourful enamels. “Thanks to specialized technicians and their extraordinary expertise, I found in enamels a new chance to express my artistic and pictorial inclinations”, she concludes. But in her bronze creations she also often embeds rare Brasilian or African stones: lemon or orange quartz, as well as rutilated, dendritic and ludolite quartz, turquoise root and any other semi precious gem able to summarize the charm of the mineral world in just a few square inches.
