Hi, my name is Paola and I live in a beautiful town in the heart of Tuscany called San Gimignano
.since I was a child I have breathed the air of the workshop, among paintings, frames and many other objects that were born as if by magic from the hands of my father, and it was he who passed on to me the value of handmade things. my father started what would later become our business by working his way through the ranks, first as a shop boy in a local carpentry shop, then starting his own business
in the early 60s he started with the production of furniture, then moving on to frames and canvases for painting and at the end of the 70s he decided to open a gallery with an adjoining laboratory in San Gimignano.
after my studies my brothers and I decided to continue this wonderful work together with him, them as artists, with their paintings and all their artistic works, while I managed the administrative, social and commercial part and everything related to the public relations.
I approached the Needle Felting technique during the lockdown period.I have always been fascinated by this art but I had never had the time to fully understand what it was, but now I had all the time I wanted and so I bought my first felt kit online and started working.
from that moment a wonderful world opened up to me and it was wonderful because I was able to channel all my negative energies into this activity. at the beginning it is not at all easy to learn, you need to have a lot of patience and attention, because you can hurt yourself very easily with the needle. it was incredible to discover that so many wonders could come out of a ball of wool... and all with zero waste, since the wool that remains is never wasted, but is always reused
I started by creating fantastic characters, always linked to the world of animals: mice, cats... and since I had to give a name to my project, Gli Stranimals were born from there.
However, my works are varied, I also really like making realistic animals such as dogs, cats and forest animals, the Fox for example is my favourite.
when I work with wool I have the impression of entering another dimension, a dimension where tensions and bad thoughts are canceled out and where I can finally dream and feel like a child again
All my works are created entirely by hand, each of my works is unique, I don't use models or patterns, everything comes from my imagination and the ideas that are proposed to me