EGN NEWS DESK
“I can simply inform when the tiles had been made by their thickness,” Mr. Rego mentioned, illustrating his level by lifting up some azulejos to indicate how they turned thinner over time, from round 2.5 centimeters (slightly below an inch) within the sixteenth century, 1.2 centimeters within the seventeenth, 1 centimeter within the 18th and even thinner as we speak.
No fee, restoration or customized order is simply too small, Mr. Rego mentioned. “We will reproduce 4 tiles or 4,000” at a price of about 20 euros, or $22, per tile, he mentioned.
The firm additionally restores azulejos, Mr. Rego mentioned, like these within the U.S. Embassy in Lisbon from the Nineteen Sixties and ones within the Lisbon dwelling of the French clothier Christian Louboutin. An artist, Sónia Guerrinha, is restoring a panel from an previous palace in Sintra that’s being was a resort. There are parts of particular person tiles lacking, in addition to whole sections of clean areas the place the azulejos had fallen off as a result of, Mr. Rego mentioned, “it’s humid in Sintra.”
That pure calamity supplies Ms. Marques with probably the most thrilling a part of her job. “I’ve to think about what it regarded like,” she mentioned within the restoration studio. After researching within the firm’s library and finding out what stays of the panel, it’s her name. “I’ll present a sketch of the design,” she mentioned, and when it’s accredited she is going to full the various steps that flip it right into a completed azulejo.
For vintage tiles, recreating the background shade is essential, and the components is guarded. “We have our secret recipe, like Coca-Cola,” Mr. Rego mentioned.
Azulejos are such part of Portugal’s id that representations of them will be discovered on the perimeters of tuk-tuks lining Lisbon’s majestic waterfront sq. the Praça do Comércio and on tubes of toothpaste on pharmacy cabinets. “Azulejos characterize a genuinely distinctive expression of Portuguese tradition,” Dr. Pais mentioned. “They should not simply tiles.”
