David Elia and Zoe Hillyard are proud to announce the exclusive Chita Hybrida ceramic collaboration.
The vases represents a typical Brazilian stew pot. Symbol for a melting pot of cultures. Each vase is unique within a limited edition of 8.

This project highlights the popular and colorful Brazilian chintz fabric. Tracing back the historic roots of how this iconic textile came to exist subsequently becaming a symbol of tropicality in the 1970s right after the Hippie and Tropicalist movement (end of the 1960s) in Brazil.

The object evoques the story of the Brazilian Chita fabric by tracing its origins all the way back to its Indo-European roots by way of Great Britain, Portugal and Holland. Use of historic reproduction textiles: Chita de Alcobaça from Portugal, Liberty Fabric from the UK and textiles from the Den Haan & Wagenmakers collection brought by the merchants of the Dutch East India Company in the 18th and 19th century.
The Brazilian Chita (Chintz) was brought to Brazil during the European colonization. Chita production began in Brazil in the early XIX Century and underwent many improvements throughout the years before the modern day chita came into widespread and regular use. The chita is now considered an icon of national identity in Brazil.

Cultural hybridization is the blending of elements from different cultures. I feel that without cultural hybridization, the world we live in would not be anywhere near as interesting and integrated as it is today. By studying this phenomenon through material culture, in this case the Chita Fabric, we can better understand how the melting pot of cultures from Europe, Africa and Asia shaped modern day Brazil.

Zoe Hillyard does not use any glue to rebuild the entire pot from broken pieces, only stitches. Stitches that represents different cultures coming together; in Zoe’s words “the connection by the changing fortunes of empire, trade, technology and expertise.”