Ahead of its presentation at La Santissima, we follow the next chapter of an AANT student project: the passage from a winning idea to an object made with Neapolitan artisans.
A competition ends with a decision. For the winning designer, that decision opens up another set of questions: who will make the object, how will it be built, and what might change along the way?
For Elena Sambucci, ESTRO has entered that next chapter. The winning project from AANT’s Work@Home competition is heading to EDIT Napoli 2026, where it will be presented in the Seminario section at La Santissima from 9 to 11 October.
At Hue&Eye, we are interested in the work that happens before the doors open: the conversations, choices, and practical discoveries that help a student’s proposal become a physical object.
From Work@Home to the Workshop
Earlier this year, Hue&Eye supported Work@Home alongside Prezioso Casa. The competition invited Product Design students at AANT—Accademia delle Arti e Nuove Tecnologie—to develop a desk or workstation for the home.
The brief began with a familiar object and left room for very different interpretations. What does a workspace need to offer when it shares its surroundings with the rest of our lives? How might a designer make room for concentration, comfort and individual habits?
Our earlier Work@Home feature explored the students’ responses. Now, our attention turns to the next stage of Elena’s winning project: making ESTRO.
Elena Sambucci’s ESTRO Meets Neapolitan Craft
To realize ESTRO, Elena has worked with artisans rooted in Naples’ craft traditions.
That collaboration is the part of the story we want to understand more closely. A design moves between people as it takes shape. Drawings communicate an intention; materials and construction introduce questions that need to be worked through together.
For a young designer, this is an opportunity to discover how clearly an idea communicates—and how it develops through someone else’s experience.
Which decisions were straightforward? Which required another conversation, a different approach, or a return to the drawing? What did the artisans notice that Elena had not yet considered?
These are questions we’ll bring to our interview at EDIT Napoli. They deserve answers from the people who did the work.
Why We Follow the Making
Our involvement in Work@Home began with a desire to let young designers put their ideas into practice and make that process visible.
At Hue & Eye, we want to follow an object from its first proposition through the decisions that give it form. Material selection, collaboration, and production are part of its creative story.
We are curious about the individual pace of that work: the instinct a designer trusts, the detail they return to, the moment another person helps them see a possibility differently.
Supporting a student project also means paying attention after the presentation is over. There is much to learn in the interval between having an idea recognized and preparing to place the resulting object in front of an audience.
The Next Conversation at EDIT Napoli
ESTRO’s presentation at EDIT Napoli 2026 allows us to see the realized project and speak with Elena about how it came to be.
We want to hear about the materials she chose, her exchanges with the artisans, and the challenges she encountered during production. We also want to ask what she would approach differently now that she has been through the process.
For readers discovering ESTRO for the first time, our introduction to the winning project provides the background. In Naples, we will pick up the story at the workshop door.
When we meet Elena, our first question will be simple: what changed once you started making it?
Follow Hue & Eye’s EDIT Napoli coverage for our forthcoming conversation with Elena Sambucci and a closer look at ESTRO.
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