The made in Italy that made Italy

Once upon a time ago there was a bunch of people of all ages, generally speaking quite young, who decided that it was time to unify Italy. Flamed by words that, crossing barriers and frontiers inspired peaceful liberal revolutions in nations with a well set unitarian history, they equipped with good will, courage and the strenght of ideals, for Italy they took a great risk, the highest. This bunch of believers and probably a bit fou idealists actually made it. Their personal human roads of all of them should be told, but that's another story, or probably not. The dresses they were wearing, the red coats, symbol of the unification of Italy that is celebrating its 150th anniversary, are treasured with love in a tiny little museum in the town where the Garibaldinis suffered one of the worst defeats from the French, they would have soon after won in the very same place, victory that would have been the prelude to the Porta Pia breach and to the liberation of Rome from the excessive secular power of the pope. Those dissimilar uniforms, tailored by female hands in great secret, need a constant upkeep. We would love to know that, by virtue of the love for the homeland, some important name of Italian 'alta moda', while keeping up the name of the made in Italy worldwide, would decide to repair those textures so delicate and precious that seem to be mirroring the historical and social Italian texture, to preserve and enhance them, remembering that the unification was created by those red coats.

©2009.2021

A neapolitan turtle

Naples is indescribable, one of those cities impossible to understand, at least I could never understand Naples. It's there, apparently revealing in its wonder or in its horror and a moment after has already changed, seems different. You never know if it's the most technological avant-garde in Italy or if it's a Middle Eastern casbah, if it's the door to the New World or to Africa, sometimes I think that Naples is an artistic illusion. I think to the black sea, not because of dirt, the translucent black that can be found crystallized in the Lipari's obsidian or, obviously, between the waves dancing in front of the Vesuvio in a particular day, as if there were ordinary days in that city. I do not love Naples, I admit it, and I don't hate it, I just can't understand it and I won't probably ever understand it. But, side by side with the Eduardo's books, it winks, from my  closet, in the shape of a button on a jacket or of a small stylized turtle that apparently wants to walk and run. The small icon is obviously the symbol of Carpisa, a society that started to produce suitcases and purses,  likeable, with a simple and fashionable style at a reasonable price. The society was born under the shade of the Vesuvio and in a few years could generate very good revenues and obviously to build a factory a l'avant-garde, with nursey, internal gym and facilities that are probably to be found in the Silicon Valley or in some Northern European country. I will never understand Napoli.

©2010.2020

Province travelling the world

A small town in the Piedmont province  of Cuneo, a farmers family, immediately after WWII, rebuilding a present and a future of peace, a boy with no money but good willed to work,  and a dressmaking shop. These are the ingredients for a great Italian success story. The main charachter is an apprentice who wants to astoun and go beyond the provincial environment to travel, experience places he only heard about from local aristocracy, the Earl Caissotti of Chiussano, and could only dream of, skimming the world map or watching the globe. He just doesn't want to stay in the Provincia, that world doesn't fit his ambitions. Those were the years of the Italian miracle and of sexual revolution, there's something to discover out there, a present to explore and a future that apparently wants to dance on  Beatles and Rolling Stones music. The job at the tailor's shop pays the evening lessons to get the art school qualification and gives him the opportunity to learn the hand-crafted secrets of the tailor's art. Learn a trade and it will stand you in good stead. A few years in the province and then straight to the bigger cities, landing in Rome, in placid ferment. The impulse to making the most of his creativity is stronger thatn the temptation to indulge in lead moods, much more interesting to dip into the new theatre scene, juggling between the work as an actor and as a costumier, sure he's skilled with needle-and-thread. To earn a living he does a bunch of  jobs, such as the window dresser, and jumping between jobs he gets to chance to travel to Moscow in the middle of the cold war and coming back to Italy with several souvenirs and a geographical map of Russia. No illusions. He keeps going with the display artist job, not bad earnings and, ater all, it requires creativity, conceptualisation, and ability to catch the fashion inputs,  just as, for instance, glueing the Russian map on an old suitcase. A simple, easy, good idea. The  clients enter the shop to ask for the price. That old leather and not cardboard suitcase, is not on stream at the moment, but if they like it, Alviero Martini, provincial used to seize the day with the concreteness of the Piedmont countryside mentality, thinks, well, it might be possible to propose, perfecting some details and packaging an high-quality hand-crafted product for first-class women. The idea is a good one. Alviero Martini and his Prima Classe leather goods find their way in the four angles of the planet, becoming main charachters of a long trip in luxury and of a tale by the earl Caissotti of Chiussano. In the displays of the several shops, obviously, there is always a page from an atlas or a globe. Now the factory is a big international industry and Alviero Martini decided to ride on the crest of success wiith the ability of a surfer used to run after the perfect wave, chasing after the next good idea.
©2010.2021

Provincial details, a matter of fashion.

Provincia is where trends and styles of contemporary communication are being created and then crystallized, overdrawn in the capitals of the world. A place to sense the actual essence of Italian elegance, luxury, quality, preciousness, wearability and attention to details.

If the small municipality of Antwerp and the even smaller Gent and Brugge, in flemish Belgium, are the first stage to Parisian and high-class luxury catwalks, it is in the Italian provincia that world famous fashion stylists find true inspiration for Italian haute-couture. 
Workshops and small factories specialised in crafting nowhere to be found textiles or the artisans 'bottega' tradition skills, determine details that can transform a simple silk undercoat in a high-fashion dress designed by one of the most celebrated stylists on earth.

Often finishings make the difference. A silk dress is something you can buy in almost any shop, a handmade silk dress woven with the most innovative artisans techniques, with an invisible hem, is not just a piece of clothing, is a lifestyle.

Clearly if a woman wears an accessory inspired to Pre-Roman peoples design with casual-chic hairstyle created by the local air-stylist more worried about the client than of the latest trendy and uneasy to wear hairdo, well, that's Italian elegance.

In Provincia, great artisans skills melt with the most innovative trends and techniques. To catch this unique mixture, it is vital to develop the ability to see almost imperceptible details,  hidden at a first glance.  Minutiae that in small towns are a family tradition issue, sometimes hundreds-years-old, and on the world's catwalks add that spice that makes Italian fashion one of the most celebrated worldwide.

Personalization and attention to details are core elements to  Italian cou(l)ture.

The hands drawing the patterns, weaving the textures of Italian 'alta moda' are the ones of  highly talented women able to combine strong skills with dreams. Perfect allies of true fairy tales princesses and cinderellas preparing for the grand ball. Those, among them, who had the ability and the courage to walk tall under the spotlights are the ones that represent Italian alta moda all around the globe.

Some of them opened small city workshops and provincial ateliers becoming self made enterpreneurs, others added  to their skills, and to the fundamental talent, the stubborness to turn their golden dream into reality  winning the race to success in the large industry.

Hands waiving and shaping the collective imagination of a country always on the move, always changing and growing, with its crisis, dramas and its revivals, its collective discouragements and the determination to keep going. The brain-drain  to more generous lands and  the reflow migration of migrants gone out of their villages with nothing but their cardboards suitcases filled with imagination and hunger that are going back with PhD's, stories of success and sacrifices.

The great Provincia has many of these stories and some of the most celebrated Italian excellences represent that provincial elegance that enchants the world. 

 ©2010.2022

Special thanks to the WR community and to WP

Scherherazade Provincia

The Italian province, called Provincia, is a variegated lifestyles kaleidoscope, a big pot where ancient traditions meet innovation to crystallize in new ways of contemporary living.

Who lives in the provice is usually hard to please with performances and arts: everything that is not worthy attending live does not deserve the effort to drive across rivers of traffic, postpone the (so many) things to do, reschedule the daily or weekly plannings and, last but not least, renouncing to the pappardelle that await only to be cooked and eaten is not a small issue. First of all one needs to gather information, is fake innovation or pure advanguard, is it  worthy a try? Plannig, with eyes wide open.

Provincia is the Scherherazade of the Italian, European, North-American social fabric: able to tell stories that amuse and empassion its ihhabitants so to continue to be rispected, protected in its wondeful diversity, and loved in its provincialism.

©2010.2022
Special thanks to the WR community

Provincial Fashion

We can say that America is all that lays between New York and California, Italy everything beyond Rome and Milan, and Europe everything beyond Bruxelles and London.

That's the province.

A that's where contemporary life and communication styles are being created, it's the harshest test bed for any fashion designer, and depicts the most truly and rooted identity in contemporary world.

This and much more is going to be the theme of ProvincialFashion blog.

©2010

Special thanks to the WR community