Gessi Faucets Review & Rating Updated: March 4, 2026
704 North Valley Street, Suite E
Anaheim, California 92801
(714) 808 0099
13037 Serravalle Sesia (VC)
Italy
Law Requirements
1."Lifetime" is for as long … "… as the original consumer purchaser owns the producet and lives in the residence where the product is first installed.," and is limited to "mechanical parts" and certain finishes.Read the the Gessi Faucet warranty.
☆ Learn more about faucet warranties.☆ See how we determine warranty scores.☆ Understanding the federal Magnuson Moss Warranty Act.☆ Find out how to enforce your product warranty. The Warranty Game: Enforcing Your Product Warranty..
This Company In Brief
We have long suspected that it must be a criminal offense in Italy to make or sell an ugly faucet.
Gessi's stylish contemporary faucets are a case in point. If you are looking for a faucet with the verve of Italian design, Gessi would be a good place to start.
Unfortunately, however, the company's Innovative design and sturdy construction are somewhat offset by its relatively weak warranty.
The faucets are sold primarily through showrooms and at least one upscale web seller, Quality Bath.
They are fully certified to joint U.S./Canadian standards and legal to sell and install in North America.
The Company
Gessi is a relatively new company, founded in 1992 by Umberto and Gian Luca Gessi.
It has grown very rapidly, however, moving into a small factory in the Piedmont region of Italy the next year, then building a larger production facility on the same site in 2004, and expanding again in 2010.
The original plant is now Parco Gessi, a showroom and company offices.
According to Gessi, great care was taken to minimize the facility's on the environment and to protect the quality of the water used in production.
This scenic area, surrounding Lake Orta, has a long history of merging artisanal craftsmanship with modern production technologies, producing a significant percentage of Europe's upscale faucets.
Gessi products are sold worldwide. The company operates showrooms in major cities, including Milan, London, New York, Singapore, and Dubai, as well as its signature showroom at Parco Gessi.
The company's operations in North America are managed by a U.S. subsidiary, Gessi North America, Inc., organized as a California corporation in 2007 and The directed by Adriana Bertolino.
Best Managed Private Company
According to her Linkedin biography, Ms. Bertolino has been awarded a degree as an "Executive Master in Luxury Management" and is trilinguqal in English, Italian, and Chinese.
Gessi Collections
Gessi bathroom faucets are arranged in collections that may include showers, basins, toilets, mirrors, accessories, bathroom furnishings, even fragrances.
Not every collection includes all of these components, however. Some collections include very few, while Goccia, one of the most complete collections, even includes bathtubs.
The kitchen collection, simply named "Kitchen", is much less evolved, being limited to faucets and a few accessories such as air switches for disposers and air gaps to prevent contaminated wastewater from your sink or garbage disposal from backing up and flowing into your dishwasher. These are devices that most kitchens won't need, but nice to have when local codes require them.
Gessi does not sell kitchen sinks, appliances, or cabinetry.
Gessi Faucet Design
The Italians are the undisputed masters of European product design, and Gessi is no exception.
The company views its faucets as "works of art", prioritizing aesthetics without compromising performance, an approach central to Italian design philosophy. Its focus is on creating a beautiful faucet that seamlessly complements high-end kitchens and bathrooms.
Gessi's designs are at the cutting edge of evolving styles and very contemporary while minimizing the industrial look of most Northern European and many North American contemporary faucets. Gessi designs make extensive use of sweeping curves and very crisp, well-defined textured surfaces for increased visual interest.
Its faucets feature unique design elements not found among other manufacturers, including one faucet, the Jacqueline, that incorporates live bamboo as its spout material.
Other examples include faucets in the Inverso and Gessi316 collections, pictured elsewhere on this page.
Many of the company's faucets are created in its own design studio. But the company also has employed and still does employ an international roster of outside designers, including:
- David Rockewell, an American designer whose contributions include the Colonna and the Inciso collections.
- Kengo Kuma, a Japanese architect who collaborated on the Incastri collection.
- Michael Vincent Uy, a Filipino architect in the Olivari design group of Borgomanero, Italy, partnered with Gessi on the design of the Ventaglio collection.
- Prospero Rasulo, a prolific Italian designer involved in the creation of the Rettangolo, Rettangolo K, and Goccia collections.
Nearly every Gessi design has won one or more awards at juried product design competitions, including a coveted iF Design Award in 2024 for its Perle faucets.
Other recent achievements are identified on the company website.
Knockoffs and Counterfeits
Some of Gessi's designs are aging. Many have been around ten years or longer — long enough to be widely copied by other, less creative faucet manufacturers.
A designer faucet company like Gessi has to keep producing new designs at a fairly rapid pace to stay ahead of copy-cats and outright counterfeiters.
Protecting a design is very difficult. Most countries allow only very limited copyright or patent protection for the design elements of a faucet.
It is not hard to reverse engineer a successful faucet design, make subtle changes to avoid patent infringement, and then manufacture knock-offs in great quantities to sell at a much lower price than the original designer company can possibly afford.
We wish we could say the practice is uncommon, but unfortunately, it is not.
Some Asian faucet manufacturers have built their inventories by copying European, American, and Canadian designs that do well in the marketplace.
Fortunately, many Gessi faucets are so unique that they would be expensive to copy, so their design mobility is limited and their viability in the marketplace is many years longer.
Nonetheless, eventually all designs age out, and newer, even more innovative designs are needed to retain the company's prestige in the marketplace.
So far, Gessi is keeping up.
The Faucet Configurator
What distinguishes a true luxury faucet line is more than just price. It is extensive customization and Gessi offers a vast array of customization options in finishes, configurations, and styles.
For some collections, Gessi even empowers users to design their own faucets.
The Gessi website has a built-in "faucet configurator" that allows the user to customize a faucet by selecting a height, spout shape, handle, and finish.
The Configurator is limited currently to what the company calls its "Haute Culture" collections: Perle and Jacqueline, launched in 2023.
The feature is bilingual, sometimes displaying in Italian, at other times in English. It's fairly easy to master in either language, although you may have to click on "Scegli La Finitura" to find out that it means "Choose a Finish." Overall, however, it works remarkably well.
Once configured, the faucet image can be rotated using the mouse to any viewing angle for complete visualization from every viewpoint – even the back (if the appearance of the back is of concern). It is a powerful aid to visualizing a potential faucet purchase exactly how it will appear.
Our web designers boggled at the amount of work that must have gone into creating this feature, not just software engineering and coding, but also photography. Even with the help of artificial intelligence, it must have taken weeks if not months to perfect.
We used the Configurator to customize the Perle faucet displayed on this page. We chose a Bronze finish with the Battulo Glass handle.
If you don't like our choices, try your own. With two heights, fifteen finishes, and eight handle materials, including natural stone and glass, you have a choice of at least 240 configurations. Have fun!
Other faucet companies have a similar feature.
Goccia Faucets
Image Credit: Gessi S.p.A
Floor-mounted, standard height, vessel sink, and ceiling-mounted lavatory faucets from the Goccia collection by designer Prospero Rasulo.
Floor and Ceiling Faucet Mounting
Most Gessi faucets are designed for the usual wall or "deck" (i.e., countertop) mounting.
Some, however, attach to the ceiling and some to the floor, for a modern, minimalist design and a clean, clutter-free countertop. (See the faucets in the Goccia Collection.)
Our architectural historian in residence tells us that floor-mounted sink faucets were fairly common in the late Victorian Era. Floor-mounted clawfoot tub fillers were simply adapted to feed lavatory sinks.
Some early 1900s Hajoca plumbing catalogs show floor-mounted sink fillers. But it is not a design that has been seen very often since the 1920s.
Floor mounting will not work in every bath, but where it would work, it would create a unique design statement.
Ceiling-mounting is old hat, but in commercial kitchens rather than home bathrooms.
The commercial products are fairly ugly but very functional. Gessi has removed the ugly, but retained the functional, and moved it into the bathroom. We have seen one in action, and it is definitely impressive.
Gessi Faucet Construction
Gessi builds its faucets using traditional faucet construction in which the body and spout direct water flow as well as give the faucet its appearance.
It does not use the emerging technology called "core and shell," in which the parts of the faucet that control the flow of water (the "core") are separate from the components that give the faucet its appearance (the "shell").
Core and Shell
In core and shell, water is directed through hidden tubes inside the body and spout.
Water enters the faucet through the supply lines under the sink that connect to the valve cartridge. When water is wanted, a handle opens the cartridge to dispense water. But instead of sending it to the spout, it feeds it to a tube inside the spout. The tube, usually made of metal (copper, aluminum, or zinc) or PEX [1] conveys the water to the aerator and then out to the sink.
All this tubing is ugly, so it needs to be concealed inside a decorative "shell" to make the faucet pretty. Its shell is the component that gives the faucet its appearance.
Core and shell construction has several advantages and no known disadvantages.
- It saves substantially on the cost of manufacturing a faucet.
- The water passing through the faucet never touches the shell, so it cannot pick up any lead or other contaminants from the brass. This means that the shell can be made from ordinary leaded brass, which is much less expensive than lead-free brass.
- The decorative outer shell doesn't need to be very strong. Since it's not a structural element and doesn't have to handle water pressure, it can be made of thinner metal, saving on material and fabrication costs.
- It separates function from appearance, increasing design options and making the design process more flexible.
- In conventional faucet construction, the design of the faucet can affect how well the faucet works. Designers have to be constantly aware of how a design element might affect the operation of the faucet.
- With core and shell technology, water is entirely contained within the internal core. The design of the exterior shell has little or nothing to do with the operation of the faucet, so designers are free to concentrate on how it looks rather than how it works.
- It increases manufacturing flexibility by using the same core for many different faucets produced by simply covering the core with different shells.
- To completely change the appearance of the faucet, the owner just needs to unscrew the existing shell and attach a new one. No plumber needs to be involved since the core unit stays the same. It is not uninstalled, and a new faucet is not attached to the water system..
Core and shell technology is expanding. At least two major U.S. faucet companies, have adopted the construction method for some of their more recent faucets, and Moen is making good use of its shell-swapping feature.
Whether Gessi will adopt the new construction method is an open question, but odds are, probably not very soon. The company, justifiably, prides itself on making traditional faucets the traditional way, and whatever may be the advantages of core and shell, it is not at all traditional.
But you just never know. It might happen.
Conventional Manufacturing
Gessi's factory is not a craft shop. It is a modern factory, equipped with a vast array of machinery, much of it computer-controlled, providing a mix of high-tech processing and traditional hand craftsmanship.
Traditional construction starts with bars, rods, and sheets of primary faucet materials, lead-free brass or stainless steel. The company cuts, machines, grinds, brazes, welds, and polishes the metal until the desired faucet part is produced.
Some handwork is involved, but not all that much compared to prior decades. Most of the work is done by computerized machines. They are fast, very precise, and relieve workers of tedious, repetitive tasks, leaving artisans to concentrate on the fine-tuning.
Only the work that cannot be mechanized is still done by hand: some brazing, welding, and the final polishing of parts that machines are not adept enough to handle. Hand polishing is an art. It takes a long time to develop just the right deft touch.
When a faucet is ordered, the parts required to make it are retrieved from inventory, and the faucet is assembled, inspected, then boxed and shipped.
Gessi Faucet Materials
Most of a Gessi faucet is made from its primary material, either brass or stainless steel. A few minor internal parts are made from what appears, from a visual inspection, to be zinc. Zinc used in the right places is suitable as a faucet material. Gessi, however, denies that it uses zinc.
Aerators
Aerators are usually plastic. All of the ones we examined were made by Neoperl, the company that invented the modern engineered aerator and supplies them to most of the world's better faucets.
The original aerator was invented by Elie Aghnides, a Greek engineer, in 1943. Early aerators were often nothing more technologically advanced than a few layers of window screen inserted at the tip of the spout to soften the stream of water by mixing in a little air to prevent splashing. Even this pioneering technology was amazingly effective.
Modern aerators, however, are a giant step up, precision-engineered devices that not only shape and soften the stream of water but also limit water flow to the maximum allowed by law.
For faucets with integrated sprays, aerators prevent that could contaminate the household water system.
Kitchen Sprays
Gessi's kitchen faucet sprays ("wands" in faucet-speak) are metal, although exactly which metal we don't know. Most probably, they are made from the same primary metal as the faucet, either brass or stainless steel.
Many faucet companies, including some upscale companies like have switched from metal to plastic wands.
The advantage of plastic is that it is lighter and does not get uncomfortably hot in use. The disadvantage is that plastic wands fail more often.
The sure cure for metal wands that get too hot is to reduce the water temperature. Nothing needs to be rinsed in scalding hot water.
OEM Manufacturing
Gessi manufactures faucets for other companies as an manufacturer.
At one time, for example, Gessi manufactured at least four faucets for the Swiss faucet company, This relationship, however, appears to have ended with the sale of Franke's residential water products to Gessi's Italian rival,
Gessi Faucet Valves
Modern faucet valves are housed in removable cartridges, unlike valves in the early years of faucet manufacturing, when they were a part of the faucet itself. The advantage of cartridges is that they can be easily removed and replaced, quickly restoring the faucet to full functionality.
Nor do today's valves use vulnerable rubber washers to control water flow. Rubber wears out fairly quickly and needs to be replaced once or twice each year. Modern valves use nearly indestructible ceramic discs that don't wear out.
Buying Rule for
the Smart Faucet Buyer
Valve Cartridge
Never buy a faucet unless you know the type of cartridge used in the faucet and who made it.
Its cartridge is the most critical part of a faucet. It is the component that actually controls water flow. Without a working cartridge, a faucet is no longer a faucet.
Companies that use good-quality cartridges in their faucets usually disclose the cartridge source on their websites. Those that don't will happily identify the cartridge in a call to customer service.
If the company refuses to reveal the sources of its cartridges (because it is a "trade secret"), you can generally assume one of two things: either it is not one of the better brands or the company is trying to create a monopoly on selling replacement cartridges.
Faucet companies do not make their own valve cartridges, not even those companies like
The equipment, technology, and skills required to manufacture ceramic valves are very different from those required to make faucets.
Cartridges are made by highly specialized technical ceramics companies that know how to "cook" and polish the super-hard ceramic discs that are the heart of a modern valve.
Gessi uses a lot of different ceramic cartridge valves in its faucets, more so than most other companies that design their faucets around just a few valves to reduce inventory.
Gessi appears to design its faucets first, then select the cartridge valve that best fits the faucet's design.
It gives the company much more design flexibility, but vastly increases the number of different valves to be inventoried, which can become a massive logistical headache.
Valve Cartridge Sources
Most of Gessi's cartridges, as one would expect, are made in Italy.
We identified cartridges from Studio Tecnico Sviluppo e Ricerche (STSR) S.r.L. and Hydroplast, S.r.L., both excellent Italian cartridge makers, and several cartridges from Galatron Plast S.p.A., an Italian technical ceramics company that is credited with developing the standardized designs used in most modern ceramic faucet cartridges,[2]
The ceramic material is one of the hardest substances known to chemistry and does not wear out ater a few years like rubber O-rings and washers used to control water in earlier faucet valve systems.
We also found a valve cartridge made by Kerox KFT, a technical ceramics company in Hungary that makes what many believe is the best European ceramic cartridge.
Gessi's Galatron Cartridges
We did not find any cartridges that we could identify as made in Asia. Some Asian Companies like Geann (Taiwan) and Sedal (China) make very good cartridges. Gessi has simply chosen not to use them.
Gessi's valve cartridges are fully certified to North American standards.
They have passed the two critical tests: the life-cycle test that puts the valve through 500,000 on/off cycles to see if it has the required durability, and the "burst test" that shoots ten times the normal household water pressure into the valve for one minute to see if it will deform or leak. (When one does deform, it can be pretty spectacular, hence the informal term "burst test.")
Standards in other countries are much less rigorous. The European life-cycle test (EN 817), for example, is just 70,000 cycles, and China (GB 18145) requires a mere 30,000 cycles. (Read a Certificate of Listing for Galatron cartridges.)
The Ceramic Super Valves
A valve cartridge contains two ceramic discs. One moves up and down to control water flow (and in single-handle faucets, rotates to align holes that control water temperature). The other is stationary.
The discs are so flat and so highly polished that when pressed together, the space between them is smaller than an atom of water, so water cannot flow. Since the discs are ceramic, one of the hardest materials known, they do not wear out.
Their invention by in the 1970s eliminated the nuisance of annual or semi-annual washer replacement in older-technology compression and washerless faucet valves.
They have an Achilles Heel, however.
Gessi Valve Cartridge Pricing
The Gessi SP00445 valve cartridge costs about $96.00 if purchased from Gessi.
If bought from an after-market seller as the Galatron 625 valve cartridge, the price is about $23.00.
There is nothing different or unique about the cartridge sold by Gessi. The two are identical, both inside and out.
In hard water areas (which is 85% of North America), mineral buildup between the discs can prevent them from meshing completely, allowing water to slither through the crack.
It may take many years to occur, but if a cartridge leaks, limescale mineral buildup is the likely culprit, and mineral buildup is never under warranty. It is considered ordinary wear and tear.
There are solutions, however, and some companies have begun adopting them.
One approach, used by the German faucet company in its PVD+® mixing cartridges for single-handle faucets, is to prevent the minerals from sticking by coating the discs with a super-hard, super-slick material called diamond-like carbon. (PVD+ because the process used to coat the discs is physical vapor deposition.)
The material is nearly as hard as diamond (hence, "diamond-like"), virtually eliminating wear on the cartridge. It is also very slippery. Dissolved minerals simply cannot get a grip on the discs, so they cannot stick and form deposits.
The second solution is to remove the deposits as they form. This is the approach adopted by in its Diamond Seal Technology® cartridges.
One disc is coated with very fine particles of diamond grit that constantly grind away mineral deposits and, as a bounus, also ensures that the discs remain absolutely flat and smooth for a perfect seal throughout their lifetime.
These disks have been tested to far beyond the 500,000-cycle standard cartridge test. The PVD+ cartridge was tested to four million cycles (about 580 years of typical use), and the DST disk to five million (700 years).
How to Clean a Ceramic Valve Cartridge
If your faucet starts to drip after several years, the problem is most likely the valve cartridge.
It's probably not defective, just clogged up with mineral deposits accumulated over the years from your hard water.
The two ceramic discs that shut the water off no longer mesh perfectly, allowing a few drops to wiggle through.
To return it to full functionality, removing the limescale deposits is usually all that is required.
Here is how that can be done:
- Remove the cartridge following the instructions in your faucet manual. (You did keep the manual, didn't you? If not, download a copy from the Gessi website.)
- Soak the cartridge for up to 30 minutes in a solution of 50% household vinegar and 50% water, preferably distilled water.
- While you are waiting, take a toothbrush soaked in the vinegar/water mixture and clean the cavity in the faucet that holds the cartridge. Wipe it dry with a clean cloth.
- Rinse the cartridge thoroughly in clean, cold water.
- Lubricate the O-ring(s) and rubber washers, if any, with silicon plumber's grease.
- Reinstall the cartridge.
If the mineral build-up is substantial, you may have to do this more than once.
To prevent future mineral buildup, clean the cartridge every 5 years, more often in very hard water areas.
View a good video by Fluid on how to clean a ceramic cartridge.
Gessi's does not use super cartridges as of yet, but this is the direction in which the industry is moving.
Valve Cartridge Pricing
The Gessi website does not show any valve cartridges for sale. So, we contacted Gessi customer support for pricing and availability.
We were told that a typical price for a mixing cartridge for single-handle faucets is around $125.00. For a pair (one hot, one cold) of stem cartridges for two-handle faucets, the average outlay would be $120.00.
After-market prices from faucet parts suppliers are much lower.
A replacement Hydroplast cartridge from an Italian supplier (delivered from the U.S.) is priced at less than $30.00.
For Galatron cartridges, the price is even lower, averaging $28.75. (We were unable to find a comparison for Studio Tecnico cartridges. The brand is not used much in faucets sold in North America.)
The price disparity in Europe is about the same. A cartridge purchased from Gessi costs about four times as much as the exact same cartridge from an after-market faucet parts supplier. (See Gessi Valve Cartridge Pricing, elsewhere on this page.)
So, why buy a replacement cartridge from Gessi? Two reasons:
- Guaranteed Fit: From Gessi, you are certain to get exactly the right cartridge and a guarantee that it will fit. Since Gessi sometimes customizes cartridges, an off-the-shelf replacement may not work properly.
- You will very likely get an exact fit from an after-market supplier, because in most cases the after-market is the exact cartridge that Gessi sells, but it's not guaranteed.
- For those rare instances in which it is not an exact match, make sure the after-market cartridge is returnable.
- Warranty: Aftermarket sellers may not provide a guarantee. Some do, some don't.
- Gessi guarantees its cartridges for five years against premature failure due to a manufacturing or material defect, but not against failure due to mineral buildup – the most common cause of leaks.
- Gessi is not alone. No faucet company that we know of guarantees against mineral buildup, even those companies whose super cartridges make mineral buildup almost impossible.
Gessi Faucet Finishes
A few years ago, Gessi faucets were available in just a handful of finishes.
Most could be finished in polished chrome. Some bath faucets are also offered in satin chrome, gold, satin gold, finox, and white or black.
Kitchen faucet finishes were more limited: polished chrome and some in finox. No other finishes were available.
Gessi's finish palette has greatly expanded since those early days. In fact, if special order finishes are included, there is almost no facet finish that is not available from Gessi. If you want your faucet to exactly match the pewter frame on the antique mirror you inherited from Grandma, Gessi can probably do it.
Nearly 40 finishes are in Gessi's standard current chart, and we may have missed a few. (View the entire array of Gessi's standard finishes, including detailed information and care requirements for each finish.)
Many Gessi faucets are available in , in which two or more different finishes are applied to the same faucet, and in RAL colors (by special order), for precise color matching among products from different manufacturers.
RAL's Rainbow
Pure Red).
Steel Finishes
The Brushed and Mirror Steel finishes do not appear to be applied coatings. They are the stainless steel material of the faucet, polished or brushed to create a decorative surface.
A clear topcoat may then be applied to protect against fingerprints, which tend to show up readily on unprotected steel.
Steel finishes should not be confused with "finox," which is an applied coating over brass that mimics stainless steel.
What is Finox?
Physical Vapor Deposition
According to the Gessi website, thirteen of the Gessi finishes are the nearly indestructible (PVD) coatings.
The PVD finishing process borders on magic.
Load a vacuum chamber with unfinished faucet components. Remove all the air and add back a carefully calculated mix of inert and reactive gases.
Add a chunk of the metal to be used for the coating, usually in the form of a rod, then heat that rod to a temperature so high that it dissolves into individual atoms.
The atoms mix with the various gases to get the color and finish effects you want and are then deposited in a very thin layer – 2 to 5 microns – on the faucets.
Although very thin, the coating is bonded to the faucet at the molecular level so it cannot separate (the industry term is "delaminate") from the underlying faucet material.
It is also very hard (Rockwell HRC-80+ and Vickers HV-2600+) and very dense, nearly impervious to damage.
Different finish colors and effects are created by using different plating metals and varying the mix of reactive gases.
Titanium, an inert, dull gray metal in its natural state, can be used to create Gesi's Brushed Brass PVD finish by combining it with nitrogen gas. Adding a touch of methane to the mix reddens the color, resulting in Copper or Warm Brass PVD finishes.[3]
To view faucet components being given their PVD finishes using a process called reactive sputtering, check out this brief video (after you skip past the inevitable advertisement). Be aware that it is very noisy, so you might want to turn down the volume on your player.
No doubt chemists and materials scientists can explain exactly how and why this magic works. We can't, but it is certainly amazing to watch.
Laboratory tests have shown PVD finishes to be 10 to 20 times more scratch-resistant than electroplated chrome.
In our admittedly less scientific tests, a Scotch Brite® heavy-duty scouring pad was able to damage a PVD finish slightly, and it took considerable effort.
Brillo® pads had no effect at all. (Nonetheless, keep all scouring pads far, far, far away from all faucet finishes.)
Electroplating
Chrome, Nickel, and Finox finishes are , as are Gold CCP and Brushed Gold CCP (using a slightly different process, see more below).
Electroplating is the time-proven standard, having served the industry well for over 100 years.
It involves immersing the faucet and the metal to be used as plating in an acid bath, then applying an electrical charge to both objects so metallic ions are drawn from the plating metal to the faucet.
Chrome is the most commonly used plated metal, followed distantly by nickel.
In most instances, electroplating is a multi-coat process. Undercoats of nickel usually precede the final decorative finish. Each undercoat is polished before the next coat is applied.
Nickel bonds well with brass, and most decorative metals bond well with nickel. Undercoating helps ensure good adhesion and lessens the risk of delamination.
The durability of an electroplated finish depends almost entirely on the plating metal used.
Know How Your Finish was Produced
Faucet durability is largely determined by how the finish was produced. Some finishes are more durable than others. To avoid disappointment with a finish, know how it was made. If the company's website does not tell you, contact customer support for the information.
- is the old standby. It is a tough finish that will stand up to most abuse, but its durability depends on the metal used.
- Chrome is durable, nickel less so because it is inherently a softer metal (the reason chrome replaced nickel as the faucet finish of choice in the early 20th century.)
- (PVD) finishes are 10 to 20 times more scratch-resistant than electroplated chrome. They are also not affected by most household chemicals. In our experience, they are largely invulnerable to harm.
- and Lacquer Coatings are paints. They are no more than semi-durable, with about the same resistance to scratches and mars as the finish on your car.
Chrome is non-corrosive and very hard. It does not visibly tarnish[4] and resists scratches and other surface damage very well.
Other metals, such as Nickel, are softer and scratch more easily, which is the reason chrome replaced nickel as the preferred faucet finish early in the 20th century.
Some metals are too soft to be effective as a faucet finish. Pure (24 kt.) gold, for example, is so soft (Mohs hardness of 2.5) that it can be dented with a fingernail.
It must be fortified to be used as a finish.
Cobalt Coating (CCP)
The usual method is to alloy it with some other metal (silver, copper, nickel, or zinc), a process that often is not very satisfactory. The alloy may dull the gold and very likely alter its color.
Gessi uses a different approach, one that originated in the jewelry business.
It creates its Gold and Brushed Gold CCP finishes with a dash of cobalt in a process known in the plating industry as "Au-Co."
The cobalt, a hard metal (Mohs 5.0), is co-deposited
along with gold on the faucet.
Cobalt, according to our resident materials science guy, works by …
"… disrupting the gold's natural crystal lattice, resulting in a finer grain structure that is much harder than native gold."
The result is a more durable finish called hard gold.
It is, by no means, diamond-hard, but it is hard enough to work reasonably well as a faucet finish – more resistant to damage and wear (approximately Mohs 4.0, about the same as nickel) while having almost no effect on gold's texture or color, except to make it appear slightly "brighter."
Gessi High Resistance Coating (GHRC)
Four Gessi finishes, two black and two copper, are what Gessi calls its "Gessi High Resistance Coating" (GHRC) described by Gessi as using a "special galvanised process."
According to the company, the finishes are created using ruthenium to produce a very hard (800-900 HV) finish. Ruthenium is a member of the platinum group of metals and prized for its extreme resistance to tarnishing. It is very rare and very expensive, found in only about 100 parts per trillion in the Earth's crust, and used primarily in jewelry-making.
Ruthenium produces only gray and black finishes. What special element(s), if any, are used to produce Gessi's copper GHRC finishes, we don't know and have asked Gessi for an explanation. Copper is a relatively soft finish. To make it harder, it is usually modified using a reagent such as Thiourea that decreases the coating's grain size, resulting in a much denser, harder copper.
The resulting finish, to quote the company,
"… is subsequently coated with various layers of a special transparent paint, which protects the underlying metal and makes the finished product more resistant and fingerprint-proof."
We take that statement to mean that the transparent overcoat has properties that do not allow the oil left by fingerprints to stick to the finish.
Other companies, such as also offer oleophobic coatings.
For more information on oleophobic and hydrophobic (water-spot repelling) coatings, go to Faucet Basics, Part 5: Faucet Finishes.
Gessi also says that the GHRC coating has …
…superior resistance to wear, abrasion, and corrosion, enhanced durability, refined aesthetics, and lower maintenance.
However, it guarantees the coatings against manufacturing defects for the same five years as its non-GHRC electroplated coatings, which leads one to wonder how much more durable they actually are.
Non-Metallic Finishes
Metallic finishes can produce some colors, especially through the PVD process. But the range of colors is very limited. Most color finishes are some form of paint.
Two of Gessi's color finishes, Matte Black and Matte White, are powder coatings. The rest are lacquered finishes.
Both powder and lacquer coatings are commonly referred to as painted
finishes, although the finishing processes differ substantially.
Powder Coatings
Powder coats are a powdered paint, used widely in industry to produce color finishes with a process that does not require a long curing time like most liquid paints.
Daniel Gustin is credited with inventing the powder coating process during World War II to help speed up U.S. production of war materials. He received U.S. patent 2538562 in 1945 for his "electrostatic coating method and apparatus."
The apparatus
was a flame sprayer that shot colored thermoplastic powder onto a surface and cured it at the same time. It was temperamental and dangerous, but it shortened production time considerably.
Today's powder coating process, invented by Dutch chemist Peter de Lange in 1962, is much saner.
A low-velocity spray gun safely disperses the powder while giving it a positive electrical charge. The powder particles are drawn to the negatively charged faucet parts and components to be coated.
Then the faucet is "cooked" under ultraviolet light or in an oven at about 400°F (204°C) (depending on the requirement of the specific powder brand being used), to bond the powder and change the structure of the coating into long, cross-linked molecular chains.
The cross-linked chains give the coating its durability.
Lacquered Finishes
Gessi lacquered finishes are probably not lacquered.
The term is common in the industry to refer to any liquid coating, a leftover from past decades when a liquid coating was very likely to be a lacquer of some sort.
Modern "lacquer" finishes are usually created by spraying the faucet with several layers of a much more durable in a spray booth – the same apparatus used by an auto-body shop, but usually smaller.
Gessi's lacquer coatings may be followed up with hand-applied highlights, shadows, and textured effects as needed to produce a specific appearance. Some of these final treatments require real artistry to create interesting finish effects.
Painted Finish Durability
Both powder coatings and lacquer finishes are much less robust than most metallic finishes. They are usually described in industry literature as "semi-durable."
The finishes have about the same robustness as the finish on your car, tough but not immune to scratches and chips. They typically require more care to maintain a like-new appearance year after year.
Thin Film Ceramic Coating
An alternative to relatively fragile powder and lacquer coatings has been introduced to the faucet industry in North America only very recently. This is Thin Film Ceramic (TFC) coating, a liquid paint infused with microscopic ceramic particles that make the material highly resistant to scratches and other surface damage, almost as durable as the nearly indestructible PVD finishes.
Thin Film Ceramic Finishes
Image Credit:Flusso
Thin film ceramic finishes.Originally used to protect firearms and military field equipment (where robustness is paramount and prettiness counts not at all), the process is being refined by companies like CeramTec to produce an increasing rainbow of colors combined with damage resistance not available from other painted coatings.
Although available in Europe, TFC has not yet been widely adopted by European faucet manufacturers, including Gessi.
For a faucet company that has adopted TFC technology, see
The Gessi Website
The Gessi website is colorful, artistic, and lavishly illustrated with professional photographs and videos – all typical characteristics of Italian faucet company websites and, indeed, Italian commercial websites in general.
If you live in North America, Gessi will usually display its North American website. But this is not a certainty. The site displayed may be for any of dozens of countries from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe in any of five languages.
The displayed site is identified at the top right of the page and should say "United States (English)." If it says something else, then you need to select "United States (English)" before proceeding further.
Many faucets sold in other parts of the world don't seem to be available in the U.S.
| Specification | Score | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| ADA Compliance Indicated | 5 | |
| Aerator Manufacturer Identified | 0 | |
| Baseplate Included, Yes/No (Where applicable) | 5 | |
| Certifications Identified | 4 | In abbreviated industry shorthand. |
| Dimensions/Dimensioned Drawing | 4 | Sometimes in metric. |
| Drain Included, Yes/No (Lavatory Faucets) | 5 | |
| Finishing Processes Identified | 3 | Some, but not all. |
| Finish Images Provided | 5 | |
| Flow Rate Maximum Stated | 4 | Sometimes in liters per minute. |
| Installation Instructions | 5 | |
| Material, Primary (Brass, Stainless, Aluminum, Zinc, etc.) | 2 | Some, but not all |
| Materials, Secondary (Zinc, Plastic, etc.) | 0 | |
| Mounting Holes, Number/Diameter | 5 | |
| Multiple Faucet Images, 360° Display, or Video Link, | 5 | Precise visualization using the website Configurator for some collections. Dynamic finish display. |
| Parts Diagram | 5 | |
| Spray Head Material Identified (Kitchen Faucets) | 0 | |
| Spray Hose Type Identified (Kitchen Faucets) | 0 | |
| Supply Connection Size/Type Identified | 5 | |
| Supply Hose Included. Yes/No | 5 | |
| Supply Hose Type Identified | 5 | |
| Valve/Cartridge Type Identified | 5 | |
| Valve/Cartridge Manufacturer Identified | 0 | |
| Warranty Link Provided | 0 | |
| WaterSense® Listed, Yes/No (Lavatory Faucets) | 5 | |
|
SCALE:
90+ A Excellent, 80+ B Good, 70+ C Fair, 60+ D Poor, 59- F Fail
| ||
| Download/Read/Print the minimum content required in an online faucet listing to permit an informed buying decision. | ||
You can, for example, select from a much wider range of Gessi faucets in Albania. The same wider selection, according to the website, is available in Saipan or American Samoa, both U. S. Territories in the western Pacific, but not available in the continental United States, Hawaii, or Alaska.
Website Navigation
Moving around the site can become confusing.
We frequently ended up on pages with no hint of an idea where to go next. Some links lead to "404 - page not found" errors or the even more mysterious "Under Maintenance" notice – mysterious because the destination has been under maintenance for weeks.
More annoying is landing on a full-page video that you can turn off only if you know to click the "stop" button so it will allow you to scroll on down the page to the information you want. This is a "feature" we can seriously do without.
Some options are inscrutable.
At the top right of the home page, for example, appears a link entitled "Area Pro." Its purpose was a complete mystery until Gessi explained that it meant "Pro Area," a section of the website meant for professionals.
Wd did not actually find much of a difference, however, between the pro area and the non-pro area. If you click on Area Pro, information about Gessi products in North America is displayed. If you don't click on it, information about Gessi products is displayed, just in a different order and format.
It would be very helpful if Gessi changed the caption to "Pro Area," a term that makes more sense to the pros we know.
Site Search
The site has a search feature, but it is not nearly as useful as it could be. We have not yet figured out what it actually searches.
It will not, for example, find faucets searching on collection names or model numbers. We tried a search on every collection with no luck.
For two of the collections, Inverso and Ventaglio, the search found some faucet parts, but no faucets.
It does not find faucets by searching on features such as "single-handle," "pull-down," "Multijet," "Easy Lock," or "widespread." These searches are useful for finding all of the faucets in the Gessi collections that have certain characteristics.
Searches on non-product terms like "warranty," "care instructions," or "return policy" were completely unproductive.
To find automatic faucets, we tried "automatic" and "hands-free," with no effect. A search on "sensor faucet" displayed lovely images of resorts, hotels, and a yacht. Only by scrolling to the very bottom of the results page did we find links to some, but not all, of Gessi's sensor "taps" (i.e., faucets).
We had slightly better luck searching on finish names to find all of the products available in a specified finish, which is very useful when putting together a coordinated set of related products.
It worked well for some finishes. A search of "Black" found numerous products, but a search on "Black Metal Brushed" found nothing, not did "Copper Brushed", Aged Brass", or "Glossy Coral".
Our conclusion is that the website search feature needs a lot more work to make it a truly valuable tool.
It appears to rely on a keyword index, a search algorithm that is fast becoming a relic. It needs to advance to a more powerful paradigm.
Right now, it is more frustrating than it is useful. You never know if the searched object does not exist, or the search feature just can't find it.
Language
The North American website usually displays in American English ("faucets") with an occasional dip into British ("taps").
Some pages displayed in Italian, and even English pages sometimes contained the odd Italian word or phrase.
The language displayed seems to vary depending on how the page is accessed. For example, the description of the Gessi316 Lavatory Faucet Filtered initially displayed as:
"Gessi316 Filtered si distingue per il metallo tessuto, firma distintiva Gessi, caratterizzato da motivi incisi esclusivi, e per il sistema di filtrazione avanzato che offre acqua pura nel rispetto dell'ambiente, unendo estetica e innovazione."
Coming at the page from a different direction, however, displayed:
"Gessi316 Filtered stands out for its woven metal, a distinctive Gessi signature, featuring exclusive engraved patterns, and for its advanced filtration system that provides pure water while respecting the environment, combining aesthetics and innovation."
Which was decidedly more useful.
Terminology
Some of the terminology used on the site is in English, but could still be a puzzle to many North Americans.
The sprays on kitchen faucets, for example, are called "handshowers," a term generally associated in North America with bathroom shower systems.
Kitchen faucets on this side of the Big Blue Pond have "sprays" or "sprayers" (to the general public), or "wands" (to industry insiders).
Sprays, Showers, and Wands
Most languages do not have one word for sprays used in showers and another if used in kitchens.
In French Canada, for example, the term is douchette no matter where the spay is installed. So, Gessi's mistake is understandable and does not necessarily impede comprehension.
Metric Measurement
A touch of Italian and the odd turn of phrase on the website may not seriously affect comprehension, but the same cannot be said of measurements and dimensions.
These are often in metric rather than inches, feet, pounds, and ounces – our quaint customary (imperial) units inherited from England nearly four hundred years ago.
Imperial measures that are so obsolete that even the British no longer use them, and they are an absolute nuisance to the rest of the civilized world. Only the U.S., Liberia, and Myanmar (Burma) are still non-metric, and Myanmar is slowly converting.
Canadians understand metric.
Officially, Canada is a metric country, but most Canadians intermix metric and imperial units in their daily lives. Outdoor temperatures, for example, are generally stated in Celsius, but oven temperatures in Fahrenheit.
Canadians refer to their height and weight in feet, inches, and pounds. (But not "stones" like the English, whatever a "stone" is) Goods, however, are dimensioned in millimeters and weighed in kilograms.
To Americans, however, metric is wholly alien and mostly mysterious.
Despite the Carter Administration's ambitious, expensive, and ultimately futile effort to convert the country to the metric system more than half a century ago, most Americans still have no idea what is meant by 25.4 millimeters, but have no problem visualizing an inch (i.e., 25.4 mm).
The use of metric on the Gessi website for faucet specifications is common and widespread, but inconsistent.
The height of a faucet may be shown in millimeters while the width is denominated in inches, seemingly at random. (See the Technical Features Chart (below) for an example.)
Moreover, measurements stated in imperial units are often displayed in the European comma-separated format (9,125") rather than the decimal-separated digits (9.125") that are the standard in North America.
In Europe, 9,125" is nine and one-eighth inches. In the U.S., it represents nine thousand one hundred twenty-five inches – a little more than a minor difference.
We suggest presenting measurements in both imperial units (for the Americans) and metric units (for the Canadians).
Faucet Listing Information
Once you find a suitable faucet, much of the information needed to make a fully informed faucet-buying decision is missing, and much of the information provided seems to have been translated literally rather than idiomatically from Italian.
For the Art 60120 kitchen faucet, pictured above, these are the specifications presented by Gessi on its website and as translated by our staff into idiomatic North American faucet terminology. The translated specifications are in blue text.
| Technical Features: Art 660120 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Drive | Single lever | Presence of water supply connections | Yes | |
| Faucet operation | Single lever | Connects to the household Water supply | Yes | |
| Connection hoses | Yes | Height | 19,3125 inch | |
| Supply hoses included | Yes | Height | 19.31" (90.54 mm) | |
| Width | 93mm | Depth | 10,6875 inch | |
| Width | 3.66" (93 mm) | Depth | 10.69" (21.53 mm) | |
| Water point presence | Yes | Water point height | 8,185 inches | |
| (We are not sure what this means) | Spout clearance | 8.18" (207.22 mm) | ||
| Water point length | 9,125 inch | Electronics | No | |
| Spout length | 9.13" (231.9 mm) | |||
| Customizable product | No | Water mixing type | Mechanical mixing | |
| Configurable faucet | No | |||
| Cartridge type | Mixer cartridge | Cartridge size | 25mm | |
| Valve Type | Ceramic Mixing Catridge | |||
| Handshower Presence | Yes | Handshower type | Multijet | |
| Integrated Sprayer | Yes | Sprayer type | Multijet | |
| Handshower size | 0,8125 inch | Sink mixer type | Semi-professional | |
| Sprayer size | 0.8125" (20.64 mm) | Faucet Style | Semi-professional | |
| Spout shape | Semiprofessional | Handle lever position | Side | |
| Swivel head presence | No | Spout rotation angle | 360° | |
| Swivel Spray Head | No | Spout rotation | 360° | |
| Under Window Installation | No 1 | Compatibility for low-pressure Applications | No | |
| Low-Pressure Compatible | No | |||
| Easy Lock handshower presence | No | |||
| Easy Lock Spray Head | No 2 | |||
|
1. This is probably a mistake. Nothing about this faucet suggests that it cannot be installed under a window. Tall commercial faucets often need to be attached to the wall behind the sink for stability, but this is rarely true of residential faucets.
2. The Easy Lock sprayer is a feature of several Gessi kitchen faucets. The technology is designed to make the pull-out spray head retract and lock securely into the spout when not in use. We were, however, unable to find any technical information about the mechanism on the Gessi website, but we can attest that it works very well on new faucets. We know nothing, however, about its durability over many years of use.
This screen was captured in October 2025. It may have been updated by the time you read this.
|
||||
The Website Summary
Here, in summary, are some other features of the website that we think are important:
Finishes
The finishes in which a faucet is available are displayed on the faucet image itself. When you select a different finish, the faucet image is re-displayed in the newly selected finish.
This feature is very helpful in visualizing the faucet in differing rainments, and is kind of fun to play around with.
Downloads
A "Downloads" link displays further links to installation instructions, a dimensioned drawing, an exploded parts diagram, and a Technical Features download in .pdf format.
We expected the Technical Features sheet to provide detailed faucet specifications; instead, it merely duplicates the data already displayed in the faucet listing, providing no additional information.
Warranty Link
There is no link to the warranty, something that is now permitted by U.S. law as a convenient means of making a consumer product warranty available to a consumer prior to a sale, a legal requirement. A clearly labeled "conspicuous" link to the full text of a written warranty available on every product page is needed. ( 16 CFR § 702.3 (b)(2))
Installation Instructions
Installation instructions are in universal format, using images rather than narrative, so they can be followed no matter the installer's language. Our plumbers had no trouble understanding the instructions.
Materials and Sources
Neither the listing nor the Technical Features sheet identifies the source of a faucet's valve cartridge or aerator, secondary faucet materials, or kitchen spray head (wand) materials – all important considerations when choosing a faucet.
The cartridge valve and aerator information is particularly important for judging the long-term functioning of the faucet.
Certifications
The faucet's certifications are displayed under the "Certifications" tab, but in the shorthand form often used in the faucet industry, such as …
"MASS CSA recognized."
… which means something to industry insiders, but is complete gibberish to the typical faucet buyer.
This is not the place to get chintzy with words. Plain English, devoid of industry jargon like …
"Fully certified by CSA Group, an accredited independent testing laboratory. Meets or exceeds all U.S. and Canadian standards for longevity, durability, ease of maintenance, and safety. Legal for sale and use in California and Massachusetts. Meets Accessible Canada Act (ACA) and Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requirements for use by persons of limited physical abilitiies."
… is more easily understood by people who are not in the industry and much more effectively convey the message that the faucets are safe, efficient, environmentally friendly, and durable.
Website Ratings
Presentation: B+
The site is colorful and artistic, but its heavy emphasis on imagery gets in the way. For just about any information you might want, you will have to negotiate past videos and multiple images to get where you need to go.
While a picture may be worth a thousand words, a thousand pictures just get in the way. More words and fewer images would not be as dazzling, but would improve communication.
Navigation: C+
Figure on spending at least part of an hour learning to move around the site.
It takes patience, experimentation, and practice to figure out. We frequently found ourselves with no idea where to go next, so we tried this and that until we arrived somewhere else – sometimes where we wanted to go, sometimes not.
Navigation is not helped by menus that display in Italian in whole or in part.
Faucet Specifications: D
The website provides two-thirds of the information needed for a fully informed buying decision. The other third is missing. The omitted specifications resulted in a score of D (poor) on our rating scale. (Not a great score, but to put it in perspective, most companies score an F, and only a few score C or better.)
The Website Faucet Listing Information table, elsewhere on this page, details the omitted specifications.
We don't know whether the North American website is managed from the U.S. or Italy, but what we do know is that someone is not paying attention to detail.
As the website is the company's face to the world, Gessi should be more aware of how it is representing itself.
Faucet Pricing
Prices in the U.S. are, on average, more than double the prices charged for the same Gessi faucets in Europe.
| European Prices* | U.S. Prices* | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Seller | price | Seller | price |
| Aqadecor (Italy) | $894.91 | Colorado Springs K&B | $2,192.00 |
| Damura (UK) | $660.68 | Focal Point Hardware | $1,753.40 |
| Damus Habitat (Italy) | $775.00 | Italian Luxury Interiors | $1,210.00 |
| Dwelli (Italy) | $812.17 | Quality Bath | $1,885.60 |
| LineaSelect (Lithuania) | $860.73 | Reback's Plumbing & Things | $2,192.00 |
| European Average | $800.70 | U.S. Average | $1,907.88 |
| * Non-sale prices were taken from the websites of the retailers indicated on October 22, 2025. For sales in Europe, prices were converted from local currencies into U.S. dollars at the then prevailing exchange rates. Prices and/or rates may have changed in the interim. | |||
For example, the average non-sale European street price on October 22, 2025, for a Meccanica 54209-727 vessel faucet in Brushed Gold (pictured above) was $800.70. The street price in the U.S. averaged $1,907.88, a $1,107.18 difference.[5]
Some level of price bump is to be expected.
Prices for European-made faucets are generally higher in the U.S. than in the Eurozone for three reasons.
• Testing and certification to North American standards is expensive.
North American standards differ from and are often more stringent than their European counterparts, so certifications to European standards are not transferable.
Testing and certification must be done all over again.
• Faucets have to be modified from metric to fit North American standard threading and fitting sizes. This usually requires retooling and short production runs, both of which add to the cost of making the faucet.
• Shipping to North America from Italy is a considerable expense, much more costly than trucking faucets around the Eurozone.
Nonetheless, Gessi's price bump is unusually massive, and these factors account for only a portion of the price difference between the two continents, suggesting that Gessi's markup on this side of the Atlantic is very generous.
Where To Buy
Gessi faucets are sold primarily through brick-and-mortar showrooms, many of which also sell the faucets online. The one U.S.-based online-only vendor we have found is Quality Bath.
The website's store locator shows about 50 showrooms across the continental U.S., one in Hawaii, and one in Canada. This showroom network is about the average for independent Italian manufacturers of luxury faucets selling in North America.
"Gessi's policy is not to resell online, and its official resellers do not have online e-commerce sites."If that's the case, however, somebody forgot to tell the resellers, almost all of which have an online presence through which they offer Gessi faucets for sale and at least one authorized retailer sells exclusively online. It has no brick-and-mortar showroom.
Gessi Faucet Warranty
For years, Gessi has offered what is basically its European warranty to its North American customers. The warranty provided 5 years of coverage on its faucets and, in many respects, did not comply with the requirements of the U.S. federal Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act that dictates the form and content of consumer warranties in the U.S.
The warranty has vastly improved. It now complies with U.S. warranty law and guarantees most faucet components and some finishes (those produced using physical vapor deposition (PVD)) for a lifetime,
defined as
"for as long as the Purchaser owns the Product and resides in the residence in which the Product is first installed."
Ceramic cartridges and finishes produced by other than PVD are limited, however, to Gessi's original five-year warranty.
We would prefer a lifetime warranty on everything in or on a Gessi faucet and firmly believe that the quality of Gessi's cartridges and finishes easily supports a stronger warranty. But the current warranty, while still not the best, is a giant improvement over the company's earlier efforts, more clearly written and much easier to understand without the internal contradictions of past warranties.
Customer Service
Gessi's post-sales service is very good. It is responsive and California-cordial (which is nearly as friendly as Nebraska-nice). It is divided into two parts. Customer Service handles most pre-sale issues and warranty claims, while Technical Service responds to questions about the details of the faucets.
We contacted Technical Service several times for detailed technical information about Gessi faucets needed for the preparation of this report, and always received candid responses.
Agents do all they can to be helpful. They are very familiar with the products and have access to information they may not know off hand.
In our formal tests conducted over 90 days, agents scored 4.4 out of a possible 5.0. Any score above 3.5 is acceptable, and above 4.0 is very good.
BBB Rating
The Better Business Bureau has no record for Gessi North America, Inc.
However, "No Record" iss actually high praise.
It means that Gessi has never had a customer problem escalated to the BBB in all the years it has conducted business in the U.S. Had the BBB received even one complaint, the company would have BBB file.
"No Record" speaks well of the company's internal problem resolution abilities through its customer service program.
Gessi is not accredited by the BBB and not pledged to its strict code of business ethics. It should be.
Testing & Certification
CalGreen® Certified: At least some Gessi faucets comply with the energy-saving requirements of the California Green Building Standards Code. For a faucet to display the CalGreen label, it must have been tested for compliance with CALGreen Chapter 4, Residential Mandatory Measures, Section 4.303 Indoor Water Use, and certified by an independent testing organization.
Comparable Faucets
Faucets made in Europe or North America comparable to Gessi for quality with the same or better level of warranty protection, but not necessarily priced equivalently, are sold by:
In Conclusion
Gessi faucets are in the group of Italian luxury faucet manufacturers that export to North America. The group includes
It is a line of faucets worth serious consideration by those looking for a stylish, contemporary, Italian-designed and -manufactured luxury faucet.
The faucets are expensive and intentionally so.
Gessi aims its products squarely at the luxury faucet buyer, those for whom money is no object, and the faucets are priced accordingly.
For those of us with lesser means, however, a Gessi faucet may be that one sinfully expensive luxury item that anchors a more modest kitchen or bath.
The faucets are well-made, and the designs are. for the most part, original and creative – the very best of Italian design. Many are unique and not available elsewhere.
The company's complete compliance with North American certification requirements and U.S.-based post-sale customer support adds to their value.
Gessi's warranty, however, is weak compared to the standard North American lifetime warranty.
It may not be a substantial impediment, however. Gessi's target buyer is usually not too concerned with a faucet's warranty, but its failure to fully adapt its warranty to the North American market is a symptom of serious institutional rigidity.
Gessi seems to have a myopic view of its competition.
It appears to believe that it is competing only with other Italian luxury faucet companies in North America. But, in fact, the competition is much stiffer and broader than Gessi seems to realize.
Italian Design
Companies like many of which sell Best Value faucets, also offer beautiful, well-made faucets in unique designs for the luxury buyer, along with generally lower prices and stronger warranties (one with a warranty rated better than the North American standard).
To break out of what is now a rather small, niche market, Gessi is going to have to shed some of its ingrained European habits and approach the North American marketplace like a North American company.
If it does not, it may survive in this market, but the likelihood that it will thrive is not promising, which would be our loss, as these are some truly beautiful faucets.
Continuing Research
We are continuing to research the company. If you have experience with Gessi faucets, good, bad, or indifferent, we would like to hear about it, so please post a comment below or send us an email to starcraftreviews@yahoo.com.
Please note: we do not answer questions posted in the comments unless they are of general interest. If you have a question, email us at starcraftreviews@yahoo.com.
Footnotes:
2. We are very much indebted to Kuwayama Kenta, an engineer and tribologist, formerly with Toto, Ltd. and now with the consulting firm, Fluox who shared with us his research into the history and development of ceramic mixing cartridges and whose published monograph "DLC Coated Alumina and its Application to Faucet Valves" (Journal of the Japanese Society of Tribologists, Vol. 42, No. 6, pp 436-441, 1997) represented a significant advance in the science of creating ceramic super cartridges.
5. European prices were converted from Euros to U.S. Dollars based on the exchange rate as of October 22, 2025. The exchange rate varies, as do prices, so the price differential may have increased or decreased on the day you read this report.