Ricardo Garduño presents Vortex: a century-old grand piano restored and clad with Dekton

Stone and sound converge in Vortex, the latest creation by Ricardo Garduño, who has joined forces with Dekton by Cosentino to bring to life a piano that challenges the boundaries between art, music, and matter. The piano, with over 100 years of history, has been restored and transformed into a futuristic sculptural piece that fuses art, music, and technology.

The collaboration emerged organically after Ricardo Garduño visited Cosentino City Mexico City, where the piano is currently on display, and where the artist discovered the aesthetic and technical possibilities of the ultracompact Dekton surface. “I really wanted to make a marble piano, but I didn’t know that such lightweight and durable materials existed. When I visited Cosentino and they asked me what I’d like to create, I proposed working on a piano. That’s how it all started,” shares Garduño.

Among the wide variety of colours, textures, and finishes offered by Cosentino — including the Silestone and Sensa brands — Ricardo Garduño chose Dekton in the colour Somnia for its elegance, durability, and its ability to align with the futuristic vision of the piece.

The result is a monumental 600-kilogram piece, which Ricardo Garduño named Vortex: a piano that, in his own words, “represents the future, like a meteorite or a spaceship; it’s my connection to the subconscious and the universe.”

Although the technical challenge was considerable, the result preserves the purity of the sound. “The important thing is that the soundboard is in good condition. You can modify the exterior without affecting the tone, so there was no sound alteration,” he explains. The complexity lay in the adaptations and the collaborative work with specialist technicians to precisely clad the instrument.

This piece marks a turning point in Ricardo Garduño’s career: it is his 33rd piano, a symbol he associates with a creative leap into new dimensions. Furthermore, he envisions Vortex as the first in a series in collaboration with Cosentino, inspired by the union of art, design, and technology. “I want people to see that anything can be made with Dekton Somnia — from a table to a piano — and to fall in love with the piece,” says Ricardo Garduño.

Ricardo Garduño, who studied at the National Conservatory of Music and later Architecture, has developed his own language where pianos become living sculptures. His most renowned series, Anémona 440, established him as a key figure in contemporary immersive art, with collaborations including interventions for Shakira and Lady Gaga.

Currently, the Vortex piano is on display at Cosentino City Mexico City, and Ricardo Garduño plans to present it in an immersive show during February’s Art Week, where electronic music, lasers, and projections will expand the experience into a brutalist and sensory format.

Vortex not only redefines the concept of a musical instrument but also initiates a dialogue between the solidity of stone and the fluidity of sound, between the tangible and the emotional: a true manifesto of contemporary art made in Mexico.