Raffaele Asselta and Raphael Dias founded Casa Diária, the first concept store that aims to bring the vacation lifestyle with a selection of fashion, design, and art
The birth of Casa Diária
In two-thousand-sixteen, Casa Diária was founded in the city center of São Paulo, Brazil. It was established by Raffaele Asselta and Raphael Dias. The former, at the time, was a traveling agent, while the latter had his own t-shirt brand. The two joined their two careers together and moved to São Paulo, founding Casa Diária. Their dream – at the beginning – was to create something that could merge fashion, home decor, art, and natural cosmetics. As soon as they started, Mr. Asselta brought his agency company with him. Yet, he focused solely on the new concept store since the shops began acquiring popularity quickly.
The name Casa Diária came from the blog Mr. Asselta created for the travel agency named Diária. Diária is a Portuguese word that means «Day by day». The blog is nowadays hosted in a particular division on their website. On that, Mr. Asselta and Mr. Dias provide content that highlights unique places besides the quality of their services and presents differentiated and inspiring designs from different hot spots worldwide. With their store, they wanted to create their own hot spot.
Mr. Asselta and Mr. Dias also took care of the design: they created the showcase and the store’s interior. Their shop is instantly recognizable from the roadway since they are the only store with a designed facade. This gave the brand a more international look, bringing inside São Paulo a global feel. The two owners used timber as the primary material and the signs.
The Vacation philosophy
Casa Diária is round up into the vacation philosophy, which Mr. Asselta and Mr. Dias have adopted as their lifestyle. As his founding element, this lifestyle looks at the European ways of living holidays. «Vacation lifestyle is a very open theory, but it’s more practiced in Europe than in Brazil». With the store and the product sold inside, the two owners want to sell their customers the feeling of being abroad.
Brazilian people are not used to traveling worldwide or during the holiday. «We wanted to bring the freshness of vacation to the day-by-day life of people. São Paulo’s people don’t do a lot of picnics on the weekend or on vacation, so we wanted to bring this feeling to them. You do not have to be on vacation just when you’re traveling. Why don’t you just light a candle that reminds you of the sea, the beach’s house, and relax you?» While visiting Casa Diária, the customers can own pieces that, while brought home, can make the mind wander after a long day of work. However, these needs were more prominent during the covid home restrainment, where people needed to decorate their houses to make them more comfortable.
For this reason, Mr. Asselta and Mr. Dias have ventured together to build their site and add a shop feature. Thanks to that improvement, people from Brazil could bring Casa Diária’s products inside their homes or start to decorate in new ways they never thought about, like with the paintings.
The Website and Instagram are two fundamental media that Casa Diária uses to remain in contact with its clients. Social media is entirely run by the two owners that provide all the materials. Their aim with their online content is to communicate the positive vibes that they stand for.
Inside the concept store
Mr. Asselta and Mr. Dias decided to keep a minimalistic style inside their store, with very plain surfaces and white walls. This choice lies in their desire to make the products displayed more prominent than the content. Wherefore is something utterly new in Brazil, mainly in São Paulo.
Following these choices, their community comprises people of all ages, from the youngest seventeen to the seventy. With that being said, they have a hard hoof of clients in the 30-45 band.
Moreover, Casa Diária is very known also abroad. Since the store is located in the touristic area of São Paulo, a good percentage of clients is made up of tourists.
Inside Casa Diária, people can find different types of products. Mr. Asselta and Mr. Dias have selected a range of products that fit their philosophy for the home and decor section, cosmetics, fashion, magazines, and arts.
Exploring the natural side of Brazil
All products displayed inside Casa Diária originated from Brazil. «In Brasil, we tend to look a lot to what other countries are doing, forgetting that Brazilian citizens are doing better products». The owner’s end goal is to show Brazilians the preciousness of their nations. Every product is totally made from natural materials. Correspondingly, inside their show Mr. Asselta and Mr. Dias have reduced the use of plastic to the minimum, for example, using paper shopping bags instead of plastic ones.
To maximize the above matters, Mr. Asselta and Mr. Dias are continuously scouting unseen brands and start-ups in the markets to team with. They are also open to unsolicited applications. It is a key aspect of Casa Diária because it upholds and enables brands to invest in research and in the production of increasingly natural materials and procedures.
They refuse to partner with big or multinationals company because usually people prefer to buy from them, even though local products are cheaper and more high quality. In total, they now feature more than 70 brands from Brazil. They just have one brand coming from Portugal and international magazines on display. They exhibit all the availability inside their store. Even though the products are listed on their website, they’re not aiming to be seen as e-commerce, favoring inviting their costumer inside Casa Diária.
Nøgen by Casa Diária
Likewise, Casa Diária launched its own fashion label Nøgen. This carried on Mr. Dias’ professions. Nøgen, a Danish word that means naked, is a clothing brand inspired by their Vacation philosophy. The pieces are essential and minimalistic, suitable for the city or for a voyage. Their goal with the brand is to create the perfect wardrobe for people choosing the vacation lifestyle. The color palette was inspired by earth, which showed all the shades of brown and pink colors. They decided to avoid any way black and white. The release of the brand was coupled with different collections, all inspired by various travel destinations.
Nøgen is also a word game with no gender. Therefore the clothes are designed to fit both women and men indistinctly, maintaining their minimalistic line. No skirts or dresses are featured.
Mr. Asselta and Mr. Dias decided to feature their new collection Nøgen exclusively in Casa Diária. In fact, this brand is the perfect combination of their vision. Thereupon all the materials they chose were natural, made in Brazil.
Going beyond the concept store: the Diária’s art collection
Casa Diária is more than a concept store. In the last years, Mr. Asselta and Mr. Dias transformed their store also in an art exposition. They have decided to feature prints, canvas, and drawings from the most accessible to fine art. The owners are also the ones involved with the scouting of the artist to features. Again, they are all Brazilian citizens.
The reason behind the addition of art to Casa Diária was to bring their client more affordable paintings instead of the ones that people can find in the art gallery. Along with this reason is the fact that the works displayed in their store are more accessible and visible to the community.
Usually, Mr. Asselta and Mr. Dias organize art exhibitions with the artists. They commission exceptional works of art for those occasions, making them patrons. Those events took place as parties inside their shop and were then available to the seller inside Casa Diária.
After the pandemic and the continuously rising number of artists they are recruiting, Mr. Asselta and Mr. Dias have decided to rent a new and separate place for the art gallery. In fact, Casa Diária’s store cannot accommodate all the works and artists they are featuring.
Therefore, Raffaele and Raphael are currently hunting for a new studio wherein the future, in order to host significant events for their product can be displayed.
Casa Diária
Rua Artur de Azevedo 1315 – Pinheiros – São Paulo – SP
Casa Diária is a concept store based in São Paulo, Brazil. Founded by Raffaele Assetta and Raphael Dias, they bring to their client their idea of a vacation lifestyle philosophy. They promote natural and Brazilian brands that range from design to fashion. They are also exhibiting and commissioning fine art from Brazilian young artists.
