Futurology

video

Futurology is the study of how to predict future possibility and probability. Somewhere between art and science, it tries to give us insight into the bigger picture and a forecast of what’s to come. In the world of tissue, surely we would all like to have a better idea of what lies ahead of us and what changes we can expect from the market.

In his many years in the industry and his experience with Futura, Marco Dell’Osso has developed an eye for fluctuations and trends in the market. Though he doesn’t have a crystal ball, he does have a finger on the pulse of the industry.

We asked Marco to update us on the recent, and future, progress in tissue - from technology, to communications, to business trends - and of course the latest evolution of Futura Magazine, which you are holding in your hands!

CUT: MORE WITH LESS

An ideal solution for new lines or upgrades of your existing lines.

CUT simply makes better rolls everyday.

CUT is Futura’s cost saving cutting system. The system combines a trim cutter with the log saw for waste minimization and excellent cut quality. It provides higher productivity and efficiency with minimum trim: a perfect example of Futura’s more with less approach to converting.

The key to CUT technology is higher production, perfect finish on each roll, and reduced waste. The smaller the trim width, the more tissue is left to make into product. A trim of l5 mm each side can be achieved, log after log.

With CUT technology, it is often possible to make one extra roll out of each log produced.

And one of the historical sources of downtime – the passage of cookies through the wrappers – is completely eliminated.

CUT is an ideal solution for new lines or upgrades of existing lines. The CUT technology is available for consumer and professional/away-from-home products.

INDUSTRIA CARTARIA PIERETTI

Industria Cartaria Pieretti is a leading producer of cardboard which has been based in Capannori, within the Lucca paper hub since 1924.

Today, icP works on a global scale, employs more than 100 people and is a top supplier of recycled paper products, including packaging, tubes, tissue cores, and corrugated paperboard.

In 2003, started up its machines for the first time after a major plant overhaul which allowed them to both increase their level of production, but also increase the quality of the board produced despite the use of recycled input. Current output now reaches nearly 150,000 tons of board each year and they export their products throughout the world. icP won’t stop there, though. Through its continues investments in product analysis and technological research and development. They are also committed to self improvement through their pursuit of sustainable production - implementing cutting-edge technology to decrease their environmental impact - and increase the energy efficiency of their company. In July of 2010, icP created a plant to produce heat and electricity from energy recovered from exhaust steams and a post-combustion system that helps save and optimize energy.

As part of their efforts to improve the world in which it works, icP has been working together with Movimento Shalom to build wells in the African country of Burkina Faso. Through this collaboration, they have developed a biological depuration plant which makes turns 5,000 cubic meters of waste water into clean water every day, waste that is ready to be used for irrigation.

The importance of papermaking activities in Villa Basilica's past

Retracing the history of paper mills from the Middle Ages to the present times in a small town in the province of Lucca, Villa Basilica: from the installation of the first "paper factory", to the manufacturing of straw paper, until the drift to the nearby provincial capital.

What we are experiencing now is, without a doubt, the era of the e-book and tablet: books these days are read in digital copy rather than print via devices that facilitate word searches, are enhanced with video, audio, hypertext links, etc. The paper format seems destined to disappear completely when it comes to text books and even graduation theses, as proposed by the University Ca’ Foscari in Venice.

So, in the future, will we really have to do without that enjoyable sensation of turning a page, of experiencing a text in ‘full contact’, not just visual but also tactile? Perhaps it has not had the last word, but certainly history, particularly the history of the Lucca region, has been written on paper.

Let’s take a brief look back at Villa Basilica in the province of Lucca, which we find balanced on the cliffs of Pizzorne at 338 meters above sea level in an area predominantly covered with forests and fields. With it wealth of resources and running mountain water, this was the site of great industrial development connected to the production of paper.

The paper industry at Villa Basilica has deep roots; as far back as 1344, records show the transportation of paper goods. Following the advent of the printing press, citizens became even more dedicated to production, with the foundation of a paper factory dated in 1462. The true birth of the paper industry in Lucca, however, was in 1549 when the printer Vincenzo Busdraghi received authorization to start business in the old watermill named Villa Basilica which he turned into a paper mill. The rest is history, really - as we know, his “new” business became the main resource of this area.

Later, a part of this establishment was taken over by Paolino Vellutelli and, upon his death, the Villa paper mill was passed directly into the hands of Alessandro Buonvisi who was the first in a long family line until 1800, when the patrimony united with that from the nearby town of Montecatini. With the financial support of the strong Buonvisi family the paper mill steadily grew. This paper factory had been the only one in operation in the State of Lucca until the middle of the 1600s. In the following century, an entrepreneurial publisher from Lucca aided the upcropping of mills along the Pescia Minore river, signifying the end of the lengthy Buonvisi monopoly.

The paper mills of Lucca were generally constructed as three-story buildings, designed for the different phases of the process: manufacturing was done on the ground floor as the heavy equipment was powered by the water wheel, on the second floor workers prepared the pieces of linen, canvas or cotton and the third floor was reserved for ‘dryers.’ With narrow and tall windows, all the same size and perfectly aligned, the top floor was used by these workers to dry the paper in the quickest way possible - using natural ventilation.

The 17th and 18th centuries marked a problematic period for the industry as the supply of fabric dwindled and its price rose with the number of mills competing for it. Some attempted to use plant material, like nettle, to make paper. Then, in 1823, Stefano Franchi invented a method for using straw and his brother, Gesualdo Franchi, perfected the technique. Straw paper, distinct because of its yellow color and thickness, became the standard product in the area; and the paper used for packaging took the place of paper for writing or printing.

Villa Basilica enjoyed a period of growth during the Napoleonic period and, again in the late 1800s when helped create roads to improve transport with wheeled carts. For nearly a century to follow, Villa Basilica was among the most notable paper mills in the country.

Following the World Wars, the industry changed profoundly as many mills switched to methods of production where the paper exited the machinery already dry. The new system made jobs for local ‘dryers’ a thing of the past and the higher production capacity caused the paper-producing Villa families to spread to the plains of Lucca in search of space for expansion. In less than a decade, Lucca became the paper hub of Italy and among the most important in Europe. In 1985, when the Cartiera del Birindelli closed after more than 150 years of operation, the production of straw paper in the valley of Villa Basilica ceased indefinitely, predominately substituted with “paper for hygienic uses.”

And with this, an entire lifestyle - the farmers and the summer caravans of straw to be hoisted into the traditional brick barns - disappeared.

Today, along the road from Collodi to Villa Basilica you can tour a sort of outdoor museum featuring the different paper mills with their easily recognizable structure - red brick walls, openings near the roof and numerous windows once filled with wet paper flapping in the breeze.

Memories of Lucca from the maestro

The hills of Lucca are alive with the sound of music...the music echoing from more than a century of Giacomo Puccini’s masterpieces being celebrated by opera lovers from all over the world. The maestro, composer of La bohème, Tosca, Madama Butterfly, and Turandot, among others, never hid his love for the city where he was born, and Lucca has never been the same since.

Now, the traveling exposition “Puccini and Lucca,” which began as a way to celebrate his 150th birthday, is leaving Lucca and traveling to his fans. He has traveled from Romania, to Bulgaria, to the U.S. - Boston, San Francisco and now Pittsburg.

Prof. Gabriella Biagi Ravenni, director of the Puccini Foundation and the Puccini Museum, gives us a more intimate look at the composer as a man and a mythical figure in opera.

INTERVIEW with Gabriella Biagi Revenni

Here we are with Gabriella Biagi Revenni, director of the Giacomo Puccini Foundation and the Puccini Museum.

Welcome.

Good evening.

Professor, after Boston and San Francisco, the exhibit, “Puccini and Lucca” will go to the Pittsburg Opera House; what is the secret to maestro Puccini’s world-wide success?

I think that Puccini is a universal composer because his musical dramas are so perfectly constructed that the speak to everyone. Beyond the legends, the emotions that these characters experience are universal - true in all ages and places. That is why he was, from the beginning, a loved composer outside of Italy.

If you had to describe Puccini as a person, apart from his artistic talent, how would you describe him?

He was a fascinating man, who we have gotten to know through his letters - we have about 8,000 of them. He has an ambivalent personality, a man between sadness, from which I think all deep-thinking, particularly sensitive men suffer. In contrast, this underlying sadness, Puccini loved to joke. Often, we find in his letters, jokes, word games, kidding with people. Another memorable aspect is that he had a series of deep relationships with simple people. He took refuge from this worldly environment by talking with simple people. And also with women. Beyond what we know about the ‘heavily traffic’ in his personal life, he often had intellectual relationships with women.

When did Puccini discover music?

It is believed that, as the son of a musician, he was surely introduced to music at a very young age. Michele Puccini died when Giacomo was 5, so his influence happened early in his life. He did what all musicians do: put the baby’s fingers on the piano keys, and have the house filled with music daily. His first breath was music.

Puccini always expressed his deep love for Lucca, why did he stay far then from his birth city?

First, he left to study. He went to Milan in 1880 to continue studying composition. Then, after his mother died, in 1884, he had to be based in Milan for his career. Then in 1885, a great scandal exploded: Puccini ran away with the wife of his close friend Elvira, wife of Narciso Gemignani, and this caused a scandal in the city. In the following years, it was difficult for Puccini and his wife to return to Lucca. This distance was overcome in a very short time. In fact, in 1891, the Giglio Theatre in Lucca honoured Puccini when he presented Edgar, they hailed him the greatest living composer. So, his detachment was brief.

As the director of the Puccini Museum, which includes various building in and around Lucca, what is the goal of this museum?

It is an interesting museum which covers an entire region and is great because he left us with the scene of his biography. Within a few kilometres, there are different houses that were his, some of which are museums, and they are open to everyone. There are two theatres: Giglio in Lucca, and an open-air theatre where the Puccini Festival is held, and institutes which study Puccini, like the G. Puccini Foundation and the Centre for G. Puccini Studies. All of this, and more, creates an interesting museum and this was the goal we’ve set for our business.

As the director of the Puccini Foundation, can you tell us what the programme is for the summer season?

Now, our main objective is to make the museum more inviting and organise guided tours for tourists and special visits, like we’ve had in the past, Maestro Bocelli in January. We want to have tours guided by other of the museum’s honoured members, including ... (nomi?) We want to bring great people to Lucca who are distinguished for how the have interpreted Puccini.

Thank you for your time and the information.

Thank you.

TISSUE games APPs

The meeting between two worlds apparently poles apart, which in recent years gave birth to simple online video games, has now adapted to the latest trend: new apps on tissue are appearing for Apple devices.

Currently, all over the world, nearly 25 billion applications have been downloaded from the App Store, an Apple service for iPhone, iPod touch e iPad. These are incredible numbers which have brought about a true revolution even in the field of video games. In just three and a half years, the App Store has changed everything that a user would have once expected from a video game how they are made available: downloading games has become the standard.

The success of games for mobile devices is pushing more classic games for fixed consoles, portable game devices and computers out of the market. The iPhone and iPad have contributed to the slash in profits for Nintendo and Playstation. The App Store now represents, in numerous aspects - cultural, technological, but above all, ideologically - the natural successor of the console.

Same principle, different names: even the online software store developed by Google, the Android Market, allows smartphone and tablet users access to the Android operating system - a platform for searching and downloading applications published by third party developers.

It is at this point that we ask ourselves: “But among all these applications, are there any that deal with the world of tissue?” Of course they exist!

While doing a brief web search, it’s easy to bump into some games about tissue. For example, the two elementary video games created by Flash Fabrica: Tissue Paper Game and Toilet Paper Game. In the first, the player must pull out (by clicking with the mouse) each of the pieces of tissue paper from the box in as little time as possible; in the second, the objective of the game is to unroll (using the wheel of the mouse or clicking with the left button) an entire roll of toilet paper as quickly as possible.

We can find many Android games that have been made following the pattern of this last one: Drag Toilet Paper, Toilet Paper Pull, Toilet Paper Racing...where the main difference is the fact that to pull the paper, the player uses his/her fingers on the touchscreen instead of the mouse.

Back to the applications for Apple products, there are three different games in which the goal of the game is similar, but the graphic design is definitely more fun.

Tissue by LED Co.Ltd. for the iPhone and iPod touch is downloadable for $1.99. This game is black and white and has three modes: ’10 tissues,’ ’50 tissues,’ and ‘200 tissues’ which challenge you to grab the target number of tissues in 30 seconds, or play “Endless” mode where you can keep picking tissues for as long as your heart desires.

An even more exciting and elaborate evolution, and definitely more colorful, is a ‘pull-the-tissue-from-the-box’ style called Tissue Box by I-FREEK INC for iPhone4, iPhone4S and iPad2. Just grab tissue with your fingers! You can set a record for the number of sheets pulled, your sheet-pulling speed and agility, or challenge friends to a lively singles or doubles match, as the iPad version allows four players. iDragPaper by Coconut Island Studio is a free app for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. Simply swipe the screen to drag the toilet paper as fast as you can. Plus it is customizable - change the paper patterns and backgrounds using iTheme.

The best part about these apps? Unlike the real world, in the virtual world the roll never reaches the end, and the box is never empty!

MIAMI IN A FLASH

MIAMI IN A FLASH

While you’re in Miami, here are some suggestions.

Walk along Ocean Drive

video

South Beach is the place to be in Miami and Ocean Drive is at the center of it. Take a walk along this famous street with the beach on one side and Art Deco shops, hotels and restaurants on the other. It’s a great place of a stroll, swim or to enjoy a cold drink.

Peruse the Antique Market

[gallery] Fotolia_26701248_L.jpg, Fotolia_28426202_L.jpg

Every two weeks Lincoln Road in Miami Beach is the home of a lively antique and collectibles market featuring about 125 different vendors with items from the turn of the century to the 1960s. Plus, it is a great place to enjoy the weather and have a bite to eat.

Visit the Aquarium

[gallery] Immagine 036.jpg, iStock_000005373524Medium.jpg

Miami’s Seaquarium is a large outdoor facility that grants visitors the chance to watch whales, dolphins and sea lions perform in action and even get up close to touch and interact with them. It is the oldest oceanarium in the country and houses marine mammals and a wide variety of fish, sea turtles, birds and reptiles.

Tee Time

[gallery] Fotolia_581180_L.jpg, iStock_000013060590XXXLarge.jpg

The Miami area is full of great places to practice your swing or play a round with your friends and colleagues. Some of the most challenging and highly acclaimed courses are at your finger tips, which is why it is the host of many top professional tournaments.

Check Out the Everglades

[gallery] Fotolia_13301152_L.jpg, Fotolia_17573493_L.jpg

The Everglades is the third largest national park in the country and it serves to protect a fragile ecosystem of marshes, forests rivers and ocean coastline, along with 36 threatened species of wildlife. Any visit to the Everglades must include seeing the crocodiles and alligators and an airboat tour.

Miami Beach

video

The art of matching colours

Quilling is a paper craft that involves rolling and shaping strips of paper, then glueing it to form decorative shapes. At one time, these trademark coils were formed by winding the paper around a quill, giving this art its name.

Also called paper filigree, the final product resembles that of the delicate hand-made jewellery technique, with one added touch - colour.

This art requires more than a drop of patience, precision and a passion for colour combinations. But the fact that it doesn’t require expensive tools, its relative simplicity and a wealth of models, manuals and online video tutorials have helped quilling enjoy a recent boost in popularity.

You can find pre-cut strips of paper in hobby shops in a rainbow of shades, as well as the basic tool for winding the paper, even though a simple open-eye needle anchored in a small wooden dowel will do. Instructions are simple as well: insert the paper into the eye of the needle, twist and secure it with a drop of glue. Single coils can be made into shapes, like flowers, hearts or leaves and the coils can be assembled into elaborate shapes, such as snow flakes, bells, animals and little people. The paper can be applied to almost any surface to decorate cards and albums or placed into a form creating a mosaic effect. Although its precise origins are unknown, its ancient roots have been traced back to the Middle East. Between the 13th and 15th century, this technique reappeared during the Renaissance when French and Italian religious orders began using quilling to decorate relics, adorn book covers and frame sacred images. Before winding it, the paper was covered in gold, using it as an inexpensive substitute for true gold or silver filigree. Its religious connection followed the technique as it spread to England following the development of paper, despite the continued use of papyrus and parchment.

Its popularity in Europe grew in the 18th when ladies-in-waiting quilled to embellish family coat of arms. Noble women were the only practitioners of this art as it was considered one of the few things their ‘gentle spirits’ were capable of doing. During the Victorian period, quilling, along with embroidery, was a common ladies’ pastime. In 1786, The New Lady’s Magazine wrote, “[…] it affords an amusement to the female mind capable of the most pleasing and extensive variety; and at the same time, it conduces to fill up a leisure hour with an innocent recreation.”

In America, quilling’s history stretches from the original colonies to today - and its cult following is growing.

Famous quillers include Elizabeth of Hannover, the daughter of King George III, the Brontë sisters and even Jane Austen mentioned paper filigree in Sense and Sensibility.

Modern quilling has lost its piousness and elite airs, evolving from a pastime of the dames to an increasingly popular hobby, and now it is emerging as a true art form.

Yulia Brodskaya

Yulia Brodskaya, a Russian designer, has used research, along with her natural creativity and honed skills, to bring fame to this art. She has come to represent paper artists everywhere, showing the originality with which an ordinary material can be transformed. “...The main reason I enjoy paper crafts, is due to my love of the material: paper. Although I've always had a special fascination for paper, it has taken me a while to find my own way of working with it; and then it took a little longer to find out that the technique I have been using so intensively is called quilling.”
Babushka, 2011

Lisa Nilsson

Lisa Nilsson, graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design and certified medical assistant, reproduced the human anatomy in a series that debuted in the 2011 Tissue Series exhibit. Her amazingly realistic work has won many awards and of quilling she says, “I find [it] exquisitely satisfying for rendering the densely squished and lovely internal landscape of the human body in cross section.”

Sweet creativity

Bavarian cream of ricotta and orange blossom honey, dark chocolate mousse and a Grand Marnier crust dressed with chocolate-apricot glaze and an almond and rosemary crisp.

1. PRE-DESSERT - The pre-dessert must be aesthtically very different from the rest of the dessert. It is the beginning of the dessert so it must have a distinguished and inviting color.

2. BAVARIAN CHOCOLATE CREAM - The Bavarian chocolate must be fluid - dripping, but not too much, with drops suspended, but allow you to see the different layers. It is decorated with almond and rosemary crisp, placed last as the bow on top.

3. Unstructured pastry - The part that immediately follows the main dessert is an intriguing part that is often described technically with words that create a picture that has a different feeling than the final result. It is, an unstructured pastry with a chestnut cream.

4. Small chocolate with flakes of Maldon Salt - Going ahead, at the end of the plate, to finish off everything, inside a real rose petal, an antique breed of rose that is also edible, placed at the end of the plate is a small chocolate.