Swimming in Art: The Danilo Bonazza Story

In this captivating episode of the Talking Pools podcast, host Rudy Stankowitz dives into the world of custom mosaics within the pool industry with the highly regarded mosaic artist, Danilo Bonanza. The episode kicks off with Rudy expressing gratitude to listeners and touching on the success of a recent trade show event, hinting at the importance of community and engagement in the pool professional space. He invites listeners to contribute topics and questions, promising a unique "Talking Pools podcast hat" as a token of appreciation.

Rudy's conversation with Danilo takes us on a journey from the artist's early days of struggle and persistence in Europe, through his groundbreaking project for a hotel swimming pool in Switzerland, to his eventual success and recognition as a top mosaicist in the pool industry. Danilo shares the intricacies of his craft, the challenges of working with mosaics underwater, and the joy of seeing his art enjoyed in such a unique and interactive way.

Listeners are treated to stories of Danilo's ventures across the globe, from the royal palaces of Saudi Arabia to the luxury homes of Hollywood celebrities, highlighting the vast range of his clientele and the exclusive nature of his work. Danilo candidly discusses the complexities of navigating high-profile projects, including the necessity of non-disclosure agreements to preserve the uniqueness of each piece.

As the episode unfolds, Danilo reveals the romantic tale of how love led him to relocate to the United States, setting the stage for new opportunities and challenges in his career. He provides insight into the business side of his art, from the logistics of establishing a company in a new country to the satisfaction of securing high-value projects that align with his passion and expertise.

Rudy and Danilo's dialogue not

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Transcript

Rudy (00:00.452)
Hey everybody, this is Rudy Stankiewicz with the Talking Pools podcast. Just wanted to, usually, usually we say hello to Andrea at this point in time, but she's still out in the field, so she couldn't be here with us. But I did want to jump into and talk about a little bit about how our trade show went. But first, thank you for tuning in. Thank you for listening to us. We appreciate you. Without you guys, we're nothing. This is the

Podcast for the pool pros we want it to be about things that you want it to be about So I'm just gonna hit you up right now if you guys have ideas or anything that you want us to talk about any questions Send them to talking pools at gmail.com again. That's talking pools at gmail.com We'll get them if we use them on the show. I'll send you out. What the flock?

Talking Pools podcast hat. It's a pretty good hat. Nicely embroidered, good fitting hat. It's a good quality hat. You'll enjoy it, but do get us those questions. We did have a great time at the show, at the Florida show with the poker run that we did. I was nervous about it. I'm not gonna lie. I was afraid we were only gonna have like five people do it, but we had probably a little bit greater than 30 attendees.

participate in the poker run, which I thought was fantastic, especially for the first time that we did it. Everything went off smoothly, perfectly smoothly, couldn't have asked for it to go better. All of the vendors did a fantastic job handing out the playing cards. We did have our winner, Mr. Skull, at the end, Mr. Skull at the end, and he won the grand prize of $1,000 in cash, and he got himself a trophy, so that went really well. Plus, we got to see a lot of faces.

a lot of friends from past years and see meet a lot of new folks for the first time, put names to faces. It's what the shows for me are really all about, all about the people. And speaking of people, I've got a guest for you today. Mr. Danila Danilo. I'll get it. Danilo Bonanza. Danilo.

Danilo (02:10.242)
Thank you for having me.

Rudy (02:11.884)
Thank you for being here. I appreciate you taking time out of your day. I know you're very, very busy, but I did wanna get together with you because I know you have some new things going on and I wanted to talk about that. But first to start, you are a mosaicist, correct? That's what the title is. And you're one of the top five mosaicists in the pool industry, is that not correct?

Danilo (02:28.824)
Yes.

Danilo (02:36.338)
Uh, probably. It's hard for me to judge and to say, but that's what they're saying.

Rudy (02:38.647)
Yeah.

Rudy (02:42.572)
That's what they, perfect. So with that, I know you've spoken with a lot of people in different interviews and different podcasts, some even recently about your background, how you got into doing this, the different awards you won along the way, and then how you transitioned. Well, I'm gonna speak about how you transitioned into the pool part of it, because that I definitely wanna talk about. But I don't, I...

I don't want to go through your past history. I want to talk about some new stuff. I want to talk about things that people can't, haven't heard already. And that's why I brought you here. So, but first, how did you transition from doing art to swimming pools?

Danilo (03:25.186)
Well, let's put it that way. Obviously many different things, but there's one event mostly that really made me do it. We're talking about the 90s. I was a young artist trying to make my way and doing side jobs as well, masonry work and, you know, regular tile installations mostly. But I was convinced that...

there could be something else that instead of just art pieces that at that time, you know, for museums or for churches or other environments, I believe that there was a new application that was not really explored that much yet. So I was trying to push with architects, designers, some clients in placing mosaics inside their homes.

Rudy (04:23.256)
Okay.

Danilo (04:24.182)
So I was knocking at doors of architects and designers constantly begging for work, but nobody was giving me the chance because at that time in the 90s it was considered kind of crazy spending so much money in a bathroom or in a little spa or something like that. No, no, I was still in Europe. I moved to the United States in 2008.

Rudy (04:42.879)
Are you in the US at this time or are you still in Italy?

Okay.

Okay.

Danilo (04:51.39)
So I was based out of Ravenna, which is capital of the world for mosaics, ancient history, 3,000 year history of Byzantine mosaics. So.

Rudy (05:04.004)
back to the 90s, you're banging on doors, people aren't spending a fortune in their bathrooms. So what are we doing?

Danilo (05:07.155)
Yeah.

Danilo (05:11.042)
So we were hoping and I was still doing my art pieces and few renovation, restorations of some artistic mosaic, ancient mosaics in different museums or the Vatican or at the Louvre in France and so on, but nothing major, nothing different, which is what I really wanted, what I really believed that could happen. Until there was this...

big project for an architect that was kind of like desperate to try to find something new or something different for the client and everything that he was proposing was not making the client click. So then he reached out to me and he asked me, okay, can you do something different for me in the swimming pool of this hotel? At that time it was called the Royal Palace Hotel in Stade, Switzerland.

Rudy (05:53.976)
Okay, it wasn't, I'm excited.

Danilo (06:07.202)
Then it changed properties and names many times. So then I came up with the idea of creating a mosaic in the big swimming pool. So I sat down with the architect, the client and his wife, and nobody could figure out what they wanted until I asked the client's wife what she liked. And she told me, I love flowers. I was like, okay, I can fill up that pool with roses and lilies and whatever you want.

Rudy (06:31.034)
Okay.

Hehehehe

Danilo (06:37.002)
So they love the idea, so I created it. The problem, the biggest challenge for me at that time was not creating the mosaic, but was really figuring out what to do with the mosaic in an underwater environment. So it took months for me to figure out how, doing billions of tests, figuring out the right materials to use, especially for the preparation of the substrate and especially for the waterproofing.

Rudy (07:04.672)
Did you start working with somebody to figure this out? Did you contact some existing type? No.

Danilo (07:09.07)
I would know because I tried but nobody really knew. Nobody was giving me an answer that was actually satisfactory to me. So I started reading books. Obviously, we're talking about the 90s so there was nothing to find on the internet. So I was reading books about waterproofing and tried different materials that could work on cement but at the same time working with cement dishes.

Rudy (07:26.2)
there wasn't much of an internet.

Danilo (07:39.246)
thin sets at that time and you know with the mosaics and after experiment over experiment and just time I kind of like started creating my own system and which I obviously developed even further and transformed over the years but at that time was satisfactory enough that I accepted the challenge and I made it happen and the result was

Rudy (07:50.87)
Okay.

Danilo (08:06.698)
you know, made the clients and the architect very happy. And I really love the idea of creating something that then the client not only was happier at looking at it, but he was also using it and his clients were using it in the hotel. So I found a very much joyful thinking about it. And, you know, I really loved the idea of creating mosaics for

pools because the fact that people actually enjoy my art piece after it's done and not just looking at it but they have parties, they have people over, they're screaming in there, they're having fun with it. That really brings me joy. So that's why then I start... Yeah, exactly. Exactly, exactly. I love that idea. And then...

Rudy (08:47.428)
They're swimming in it. They're swimming in your art.

Rudy (08:55.04)
People dive in, they dive right in to your works of art, literally.

Rudy (09:05.882)
How many times did you fail before you got the formula correct? Like in actual applications on pools.

Danilo (09:10.294)
I don't know.

Danilo (09:14.438)
I can't really say fail. I had, no, because I had some little detachment here and there, but it's not that the whole piece fell apart. So I don't think we can call it a failure. But obviously over the years, you know, a few times here and there, due to many different factors, I had few little ties. Also think about that, you know, a swimming pool in mosaics means hundreds of thousands of...

Rudy (09:15.924)
A dozen? No.

Rudy (09:24.586)
Okay.

Danilo (09:42.094)
pieces, right? So if in the 250,000 pieces there's like three that detached, I don't think we can call it a failure.

Rudy (09:43.212)
Right.

Rudy (09:52.948)
I agree with you, that's not a failure. In fact, for most companies that put tile in three just coming off as a success. Is it not?

Danilo (10:01.686)
Yeah, exactly. So it happened a few times. Also, over time, I found out that different environments require different strategies, especially when I started doing projects in Saudi Arabia where obviously the temperature reaches very high points during the day, very high temperature, 140, 150 sometimes.

Rudy (10:20.44)
town.

Rudy (10:31.987)
How the heck do you end up getting a job in Saudi Arabia to do tile in a swimming pool? How does that come about?

Danilo (10:38.666)
Well, again, architects, you know, architects that I did projects for in France. Then they also had projects in different other countries. And, and so then after they had very successful projects with me, then they wanted to do something over there as well. And obviously the Arabs love gold and love mosaics. So it was easy to convince them to do something like that. I did a lot of projects in Dubai.

and all those countries, Lebanon, Abu Dhabi, many of the Doha.

Rudy (11:14.808)
Okay, and that makes sense. So these architects are going around from job to job and they're saying, hey, we're not doing it unless we get Danilo.

Danilo (11:21.931)
Yeah.

Danilo (11:26.266)
Well, also it's the same concept that happened to me when I ended up in the United States. I never thought about moving to the United States or having, you know, I never looked for a project here. But then after so many years of projects everywhere, one of the architects asked me to do big projects in the United States. So I came over here and then I ended up, I ended up living, no, New York. Yeah, it was New York, New York City.

Rudy (11:36.13)
Mm-hmm.

Rudy (11:43.596)
That was Las Vegas, correct? No, New York. Okay. Nice. And.

Danilo (11:52.286)
Las Vegas was afterwards, was two years, or a year and a half after.

Rudy (11:56.232)
Okay. All right. So you come to New York, you realize that it, it's just like everybody says it is. There's yellow taxis driving up and down the street. People walk really fast on the sidewalk. It's really crowded. And that made you decide that you wanted to live in the United States.

Danilo (12:14.142)
Nope. I never thought about it. I wanted to go back. The problem is the project, the project was huge. So I ended up staying pretty much almost a year. And as a good Italian, so much time in a place you start looking for women. And I ended up meeting the best woman in the world who ended up being my wife.

Rudy (12:18.998)
Ha!

Rudy (12:22.54)
Okay.

Oh, wow.

Rudy (12:42.552)
Congratulations.

Danilo (12:43.618)
That's what made me move. I was lucky enough to meet the love of my life and then I decided to jump. I thought in my mind that it would have been easier for me to jump since I'm not scared of anything than for her, you know, changing culture and all that stuff. So I decided to do the jump.

Rudy (13:06.023)
So, you moved for a girl.

Danilo (13:08.843)
Yes.

Rudy (13:10.036)
and it was a good decision. That's awesome. Let me ask you this. Does New York have good Italian food?

Danilo (13:12.042)
Absolutely, absolutely.

Danilo (13:17.454)
Uh, yeah, especially the one that I cook. No, I'm... Yes, no, I'm joking. I'm joking. I can't complain about food. Obviously not every place. There's a lot of fake Italian food, but there's also some good ones. So yeah, you shouldn't complain about it.

Rudy (13:22.972)
Did they have, but I mean, did they have it before you got there?

Rudy (13:38.372)
Manhattan is one of my favorite places to go and I do frequent Italian restaurants and I just wanted your opinion having come over and spent a year there one month and seeing what we had there. I'm going to let Andrea in now so don't let this stray off. There we go. And there she is. So you decide to move to New York. It's about the girl. Now you start working here.

Danilo (13:48.397)
Yeah.

Rudy (14:07.98)
And in that time...

Danilo (14:08.118)
Yes. Well, not right away. It took a while to figure out, you know, all the documents and everything else. I shut down my company in Italy and then it took pretty much a year or something to be able to open it in the United States, you know, for document purposes. So I was not really working that much because I couldn't do it. Then finally, all the papers were ready. I was not married at that time yet.

Rudy (14:15.518)
Okay.

Danilo (14:37.93)
I got all my documents straight, hired a couple of lawyers, got screwed a couple of times in paying lawyers a high price and then got nothing. And then I finally was able to get everything together and then I opened up my company in almost 2009 in the United States.

Rudy (14:58.616)
How'd you feel about closing the one in Italy?

Danilo (15:03.11)
It was, yeah, I had a moment that I was like, what the hell am I doing? And then I was like, you know what? Let's do it. Let's do it. I believe that, you know, it was not easy obviously, money-wise and everything else. I had 13 people working for me at that time, so I let them all go, but...

Rudy (15:03.308)
That was your first baby.

Rudy (15:22.403)
I can't imagine.

Rudy (15:26.358)
Okay.

Mmm.

Danilo (15:28.942)
to feel good, I gave them a bunch of projects and architects and designers collaborating with them so that they could just keep going with what became their companies. And then I started from scratch, but I was like, you know what? I really believe that was my shot. Never thought about marrying an American girl for sure. Never thought about getting married, to be honest with you.

Rudy (15:33.772)
Okay.

Danilo (15:53.154)
But you know what, love strikes you and it was probably one of the best, if not the best decision of my life. We're still very much in love and I'm the luckiest man in the world. That's what I believe.

Rudy (16:04.196)
Congratulations. That's awesome. So it, so you move here, you finished the project in New York. You move here. I'm going to assume that takes a little bit of time. Then you say it's a month before you can actually start to do business. How long did it, a year, I'm sorry, a year before you can start more than a year before you can start to do business. So how long did it take after you opened up the doors to your, to your new career in the United States?

Danilo (16:06.626)
Thank you.

Danilo (16:18.282)
No, no, it's more than a year. Yeah, more than a year, yeah, yeah. Yep.

Rudy (16:32.576)
before you got that first job.

Danilo (16:35.566)
Oh, to be honest, nothing. I was able to get right away. It was not probably at the beginning, not the projects that I wanted, where something very easy and small and not really profitable or almost nothing. So it took a little bit to start getting the kind of projects that I wanted.

Rudy (16:59.563)
Was that Vegas a year and a half later? Was that the first job you had that you were like, yes?

Danilo (17:03.15)
No, I had something a little before that, a few things a little before that. And also once I had all my papers straight, I could still also, I could travel. So the first big projects were overseas. I was just traveling with my wife and doing projects for some of my older designers or collaborators. But then obviously the biggest projects.

Rudy (17:07.243)
Okay.

Rudy (17:19.305)
right.

Danilo (17:30.574)
opened up other doors and other connections that I start developing for new projects and new ventures.

Rudy (17:41.448)
Now all this while, you're still doing art, correct? Not just for swimming pools, but okay.

Danilo (17:45.834)
Yes, yes, yeah. Yeah, not as much, not as much obviously, but still doing something, yeah.

Rudy (17:56.979)
And what was your first big commission job for the art side once you opened the doors in the US?

Danilo (18:05.91)
Wow, the first one. Well, I did a project in the islands of Seychelles, but it was from an architect here in the United States. So it was not in the US territory, but it was commissioned in the United States. Yeah, yeah.

Rudy (18:23.984)
U.S. originated. Okay. So you have money flowing in both ways. The pools are more lucrative for you.

Danilo (18:29.464)
Yeah.

Danilo (18:33.47)
On a general basis, yes, because usually they're a bigger project and longer. But if we're talking about per square footage, the art pieces are definitely more lucrative for me.

Rudy (18:49.144)
Okay, but you're doing a lot more pools than you do art pieces, correct? And just to put this into perspective for folks, these are not $40,000 jobs. You're talking 100, $200,000 jobs, correct?

Danilo (18:52.498)
Yes, absolutely. Yeah.

Danilo (19:03.52)
Um, minimum, yeah.

Rudy (19:05.384)
Okay, so that's our starting point. So, and that's fantastic. And well deserved. You're dealing with, you said how many pieces in an average size or I don't know, a hotel size pool. I know you've done some big ones. It's kind of hard to say what's an average size, but you've done over 100,000 pieces, yeah?

Danilo (19:08.044)
Yeah.

Danilo (19:22.347)
Well, let's...

Yeah, yeah. Let's put it that way. The average pool is about 1200 square feet, something like that. So on average per square foot, we are talking about 200, 250 pieces. So times 1200 square feet in a swimming pool comes up, what, 300,000?

Rudy (19:31.818)
Okay.

Danilo (19:53.11)
pieces, 250,000 pieces at least.

Rudy (19:55.552)
without ripping out a calculator, I'm gonna agree with you on that.

Danilo (19:58.686)
Yeah, something like that. And again, depending on the size of each tesser, which is the technical name for the tile that is in a mosaic, you know, obviously we're talking about the range of the kind of mosaics that I use goes from three eighths of an inch each one up to one inch. So obviously, you know, it varies a lot in

square foot depending on the size of each tile.

Rudy (20:30.104)
Who's your customer? Describe that person. A very rich person.

Danilo (20:32.586)
a very rich person, very rich person who likes to have something custom made, unique. And so he wants to make sure that his swimming pool does not look like his neighbor's swimming pool so we can create something different and unique. I signed a lot of NDA agreements because some of my clients...

They want to make sure that I don't replicate what I did for them because they like the uniqueness of their projects. It's one of the reasons why they pay premium money to have something different custom made just for them.

Rudy (21:05.944)
Okay, understood.

Rudy (21:20.513)
So I've seen some of the art that you've done as well. Is it fair to say that you have a crush on Marilyn Monroe?

Danilo (21:23.64)
Mm-hmm.

Danilo (21:29.222)
Uh... no, I don't know if we can put it that way, but I think she's an icon for so many...

Andrea The Pool Girl (21:36.971)
Doesn't everybody have a crush on Marilyn Monroe?

Rudy (21:40.564)
Welcome Andrea.

Danilo (21:42.518)
Hello, hello, Andrew.

Andrea The Pool Girl (21:43.53)
Hi, hi, sorry I was late.

Rudy (21:46.348)
So.

Danilo (21:47.67)
I don't know. I think she's definitely a unique character and an icon in Hollywood. She recreated and reinvented probably the female character in movies. So she's definitely a powerful figure.

Rudy (22:09.048)
She is well loved and very well recognized, that is for sure. So, and I, you know what? I wouldn't fault you one bit, because as Andrea said, who doesn't? At least a little bit. So let me ask you, you said you signed a lot of NDAs. That doesn't mean they were all NDAs. Can you drop some names here? Who have you done work for?

Danilo (22:11.424)
Yeah.

Danilo (22:25.592)
Yeah.

No.

Danilo (22:34.138)
Putin, Trump...

Rudy (22:39.816)
Not at the same time, right? Now.

Danilo (22:42.271)
I'm trying to think about who have the NDA and who I don't have. I don't want to throw a name that I can't. Soros.

Andrea The Pool Girl (22:44.511)
LOL.

Rudy (22:50.844)
If you throw out one by accident, just call me and let me know. This is coming out in three weeks. I'll remove it.

Danilo (22:54.706)
Yeah, no, but yeah, Soros, Jennifer Lopez.

Rudy (23:07.328)
more crush-worthy people.

Danilo (23:09.934)
home and then...

Andrea The Pool Girl (23:12.915)
You have a crush on George Soros?

Rudy (23:14.92)
Now it was Putin.

Danilo (23:15.306)
No. Yeah, I think I have to stop there. I'm not sure. I don't want to risk to throw a name that I regret.

Rudy (23:21.62)
That's okay. No, that's fine. I don't mean to put you on the spot.

What did you do for, can you tell us what you did for JLo?

Danilo (23:31.403)
A big mural, yeah.

Rudy (23:32.968)
Okay, so that was art. Okay. And so you're sitting there in your office. Does Putin call himself? He picks up the phone and says, Danilo, I need you to come out to Moscow. I got some stuff going on. No? How did that go?

Danilo (23:35.21)
Yes, yes.

Danilo (23:43.786)
No. Ha ha

No, no. Well, again, there's architects and designers involved. Yeah, involved. And then I had to go through all the hoops and things about being approved and checked. And not only previously, but also while I was there. It was definitely not a very easy task. Let's just put it there.

Rudy (23:51.436)
through the architects.

Rudy (24:12.297)
and the work you did for Trump. Did you do that down here in Florida?

Danilo (24:16.83)
No, New York. A hotel that changed ownership but at that time was the Trump Soho Hotel. Now it's called the Dominique. Unless they changed name recently, which is totally possible. But yeah, there's a picture with Ivanka Trump modeling in front of my mosaic. So that ended up, yeah, that ended up

Rudy (24:18.12)
Okay, I saw the picture.

Rudy (24:29.289)
Okay.

Rudy (24:40.985)
I saw that! That's pretty sweet.

Danilo (24:46.318)
on the cover of El Decor, and it was all around the world. So that.

Rudy (24:51.432)
It might be on the cover of this episode.

Danilo (24:54.828)
Okay.

Rudy (24:56.405)
There you go. See, Andrea, we have permission. How cool is that? That's a first. So what big jobs do you have coming up in the future? What do you got that's going on that's new?

Andrea The Pool Girl (25:02.652)
Nice, yeah.

Danilo (25:10.154)
Okay, I have one in Maryland right now where I'm talking, finishing up in the next ten days. Then I have one in Connecticut, beautiful blue base swimming pools with 24 karat gold accents. Then I have a hydrofloor pool in Tennessee, which that's going to be interesting. I don't know if everybody's familiar with hydrofloors, but our...

those pools where they have the floors that moves up and down.

Rudy (25:40.696)
Correct, like in the 2006 Olympics in Atlanta, the pool there at Georgia Tech, one of the first.

Danilo (25:45.414)
Yes, correct. Yeah, correct. Then I have a big one in North Carolina in September. And then others, but they're not signed yet. So who knows if they're happening or not.

Rudy (26:07.225)
What percentage, well, two things. One, how long does it normally take to close that cell? And what's your close rate?

Danilo (26:22.708)
uh... usually i don't know every project is different so sometimes could take two days sometimes can take two years it really values

Rudy (26:31.724)
Do you get a lot of people windowed? Do you get a lot of people window shopping or when they come to you, they're pretty much ready to buy. They're gonna do something.

Danilo (26:39.922)
I think most of the time they're pretty much ready to buy. But again, every project is different. So it's hard to really know exactly. As far as closing or deciding, I would say if they come to me, most of them already know that they have to be ready to spend a certain amount of money.

Rudy (26:48.062)
No, understood.

Danilo (27:07.178)
So some of them right away, they tell me, you know, you're too expensive, you know, we're not interested which is totally fine but if they really want something special they know that it's expensive and So if they're ready to have the budget to spend in those kind of projects most of the time they decide right away and

Danilo (27:32.398)
probably 80% of the time they, you know, if I'm able to sit down with a client and the architect, probably 80% of the time I close the deal.

Rudy (27:41.332)
Nice. What job do you walk away from? What job don't you want? What job in the past have you said, no, I'm not doing it?

Danilo (27:48.822)
Uh, let's put it that way. Some of the people that I mentioned already walked away after the first job, because it was not a nice experience. I don't want to say who, but some of them definitely was not a pleasant experience. Some for their behavior, some because of the payments.