Elegance that combines rigorous, symmetrical lines with soft forms

Cielo’s Delfo collection won an award at the ADA Archiproducts Design Awards 2021. It is designed by Andrea Parisio and Giuseppe Pezzano, the Italian brand’s art directors, and starts from a simple idea: a ceramic washbasin with a sculptural character resting on a wall-hung wooden cabinet with generous storage.

In this article we look at what Delfo is and why it won over the jury, the dimensions of the two versions Cielo offered in 2021, how ceramic and wood are combined, and what to bear in mind when specifying it in a bathroom project.

A sculptural washbasin on a storage cabinet

Delfo is a washbasin with a sculptural, sophisticated character, enhanced by a generous storage cabinet. A pure, essential design that emerges from Cielo’s high-end industrial craftsmanship and which, depending on how it is customised, has a simplicity that makes it a focal point in the most intimate room of the house.

The piece consists of three elements chosen separately: the Tino bowl, a round ceramic countertop washbasin; an oval top, also ceramic, on which the washbasin sits; and a wall-hung wooden cabinet with large storage capacity, plain or with a slatted front.

The collection is characterised by an elegance that combines rigorous, symmetrical lines with soft forms. Delfo expresses itself through its materials, in a play of combinations between ceramic and wood that gives rise to different interpretations of the same model, united by the same aesthetic vision and the same way of reinterpreting ceramics in a contemporary key.

Why Delfo won the ADA Archiproducts Design Awards 2021

The ADA Archiproducts Design Awards are the product design awards of the Archiproducts platform. In the 2021 edition, the shortlist was announced on 28 October and the winners in November. According to Cielo, the jury was made up of 50 international representatives from the design world and some of the most influential architecture practices.

The quality in Delfo that won over the jury, according to the manufacturer, is its versatility. With its many combinations of colours and finishes and its compact dimensions, Delfo’s design is at once minimalist, practical and refined, and it plays with contrasts: between wood and ceramic, between rigour and sinuousness, between solidity and lightness.

Two sizes: Delfo 113 and Delfo 76

In 2021 Delfo was offered in two widths. The 113 cm version was joined by a 76 cm version, launched that same year for small bathrooms. The table shows the dimensions from Cielo’s catalogue at the time.

Cielo describes Delfo 76 as a pared-back, essential version that enhances even the smallest spaces without sacrificing storage: the wooden drawer keeps its capacity and gives the bathroom a welcoming, functional feel.

Ceramic and wood: colours and finishes

The washbasin sits on a refined oval ceramic top and rests on an elegant wall-hung wooden cabinet, which gives the whole a strong decorative value. The bowl and the top can be the same colour or combined in different tones.

• Tino bowl and oval top: ceramic in the 16 matt tones of the Le Terre di Cielo palette, the 6 gloss tones of Le Acque di Cielo (Oltremare, Smeraldo, Alga, Corallo, Ninfea and Anemone) and gloss white.
• Plain cabinet: in wood — Natural Oak, Bleached Oak, Grey Oak, Black Oak and Eucalyptus — or lacquered in eight colours: Talco, Pomice, Brina, Basalto, Cemento, Arenaria, Avena and Muschio.
• Slatted cabinet: front of triangular solid wood slats, in the same five woods as the plain version.

The aesthetic impact is heightened in the version with the wall-hung cabinet fronted by triangular solid wood slats: a craft detail that creates plays of light and shadow on the surface and which, like the plain version, is made in Eucalyptus, Natural Oak, Bleached Oak, Grey Oak and Black Oak.

Key points for specifying Delfo

Beyond aesthetics, these are the points worth resolving at design stage:

• Width and depth: the 76 cm version, with a 48 cm depth for the plain cabinet, is designed for cloakrooms and small bathrooms; the 113 cm version leaves free surface space beside the washbasin.
• Washbasin position: the countertop washbasin sits to one side of the oval top. The side (right or left) should be fixed before defining the water supply and waste points.
• Taps: Cielo’s catalogue shows both wall-mounted taps and tall taps on the top. This decision affects the installation and should be made early.
• Colour: the bowl, top and cabinet are chosen separately, allowing tone-on-tone or contrasting combinations. It is worth seeing the ceramic and wood samples together before finalising the combination.
• The bathroom as a whole: in the settings in its catalogue, Cielo pairs Delfo with its mirrors (Eos, Eos-c, Oval Box or Simple Tall Box) and with WCs and bidets in the same ceramic colours.

Cielo under the direction of Parisio and Pezzano

Ceramica Cielo is an Italian bathroom ceramics manufacturer based in Fabrica di Roma (Viterbo). Its aim, according to the brand itself, is to take ceramics beyond their known limits by exploring new forms, dimensions, thicknesses, surfaces and colours; hence palettes such as the matt Le Terre di Cielo and the gloss Le Acque di Cielo.

Andrea Parisio and Giuseppe Pezzano have been the brand’s art directors since 2015. Parisio, born in Lodi in 1964, trained at IED Milan and the Academy of Pavia and in 2000 launched Meridiani. Pezzano, an architect born in Locri in 1974 who graduated in Florence, headed the Milan office of Archea Associati and in 2010 founded his own studio in Milan.

Postscript (2026): after the award, Cielo extended the collection with 152 and 226 cm widths and a ceramic top covering the whole surface of the cabinet, as an alternative to the oval top.

At Matter we help you plan the whole bathroom: the ceramics, the cabinetry, the taps and the surfaces that go with them. Come to our material library to compare colours, woods and finishes with your technical team.