Alessi — Toru NE03 NE03 B/UK | Black stainless steel toaster by Nendo

There is something almost meditative about the way Toru occupies the kitchen counter. Its form is quiet, compact, deliberately understated: 18/10 stainless steel meets thermoplastic resin in a deep, uniform black, without frills or excess. An object that does not shout its presence but asserts it discreetly, as truly well-designed things know how to do. The proportions are calibrated to the millimetre - 32 centimetres wide, 25 high - and its weight in the hand conveys that reassuring solidity belonging to tools designed to last. Toru was designed by Nendo, the Japanese design studio founded by Oki Sato that has made reduction its poetic language. Active between Tokyo and Milan, Nendo are masters at purifying objects of the superfluous, revealing a formal essence that borders on the abstract. Here too, as in the rest of their work, the design gesture is almost invisible: what remains is the thing itself, in its purest form. The collaboration with Alessi - always a research laboratory where function and material culture intertwine - has produced a toaster that is, above all, an idea of what a toaster should be. We chose it for Stilmobili because it is exactly the kind of object we believe in: everyday but not banal, functional yet capable of elevating the kitchen's aesthetics without turning it into a stage set. It is the right gift for those who live consciously, for those who do not separate design from breakfast, for those who recognize in the matte black of an appliance the same care reserved for a vase or a chair. Project notes: power 775–925 W, body in 18/10 stainless steel and thermoplastic resin, black finish. Version with UK plug. Dimensions 32 × 19 × 25.5 cm. Produced by Alessi, autumn/winter collection.