History

Our history

THE NAME GOLEM

According to legend, Rabbi Löw created this strange creature – the Golem – in 16th century Prague with the help of fire and magic to protect the Jewish community. It possessed special powers, was of enormous size, threatening in its form, but also had a positive connotation:

 

“For us it was about the image of creating something alive out of clay. And our golem was also supposed to be a little scary – after all, we wanted to intimidate our competitors.” (laughs)

Tomas Grzimek, Founder

Since the early 1990s, we have been bringing clay to life with fire and producing replicas of historical building ceramics for restoration. Not only classical bricks in historical formats were made by us for this purpose, but also shaped bricks, elaborate terracottas and colour-intense glazed facing bricks.

Finally, we received requests for the restoration of floor tiles from the Wilhelminian period and wall panels designed with Art Nouveau tiles. For this purpose, we revived old craftsmanship techniques or developed them completely from scratch, as much knowledge about tools and formulas was lost with the First World War.

FIRE

Chamber kilns with long firing times – thanks to many years of experience and individual production techniques beyond any mass production, we give every ceramic its ideal treatment. The focus is on the best result and not on compulsive time-saving at the expense of the product.

CLAY

We focus on craftsmanship – GOLEM stands for tradition in the best sense. Not only in terms of production, but also our raw materials are made from the best sources and materials: clays and minerals.

PASSION

The use of traditional handicraft techniques enables us to find individual solutions and is reflected in the lively character of the finished product. From mould making to modelling and firing, all the work steps are carried out in-house.

Modelling, pressing, shaping, drying, firing, glazing and firing again – before a product leaves our house, it passes through many hands, is processed, tested, approved. Our wall tiles, floor tiles and special productions for restoration not only look like they did 100 years ago, they are also made that way.

A multitude of corner solutions and spandrels for our tiles enable an all-ceramic solution entirely without modern building products such as metal rails.

References

Hand-made bricks

A modern residential house clad from the wall to the distinctive roof slopes with differently coloured hand-made bricks and shaped stones.

Formsteine - Gitterstein-Elemente für den Lohsepark in Hamburg

Shaped bricks

Development of lattice stone elements to enclose the bastions for Lohsepark in Hamburg’s Hafencity.

glasierte Verblender im Foyer des Tour Total in Berlin

GLAZED FACING BRICKS

GOLEM produced white glazed facing bricks for the wall relief in the foyer of the Tour Total in the Europa City Berlin.

All references

INTERVIEW WITH FOUNDER TOMAS GRZIMEK

»IT’S THE LONGING FOR THE INDIVIDUAL«

 

Tomas Grzimek comes from a family of artists. More than 25 years ago, he founded the ceramic manufactory GOLEM. Today, he supplies architects and designers worldwide with his handmade Art Nouveau tiles.

INTERVIEW