Benedetta Bruzziches' red carpet bags breathe life back into the land
In Caprarola, in the heart of Latium's Tuscia region, the entrepreneur and designer has founded a company of accessories that are loved the world over, handmade and capable of reactivating skills and knowledge at risk of extinction
CAPRAROLA (VT) - On one of the frescoed vaults of the magnificent Palazzo Farnese in Caprarola, a village of 5,000 inhabitants in the province of Viterbo, the story is told of how mankind learnt to produce textiles and clothes. The cycle can be found in the Stanza dei Lanifici, where Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, the architect of the 16th-century building, placed everything needed for the textile production of his residence. Making clothes, in those days, was a community gesture. "For the local ladies, 'making coats' is still synonymous with chatting, as it was when they would gather in the house to sew clothes for the many Tuscia cobblers. These gatherings were held for decades, until delocalisation and the evolution of the local economy extinguished them. At least until someone in Caprarola wanted to revive this community creation.
It was 2009 when Benedetta Bruzziches - a diploma at the Ied in Rome, experience in the style office of Romeo Gigli, a revelatory trip to the bag factories of India - together with her brother Agostino decided to take the risk of reviving the local packaging industry. "Then, in 2017, at a fair I found a wonderful material, a crystal mesh, and I realised that it would work great for the bags I had in mind. But it needed people who knew how to make them, by hand. That's why, little by little, talking to people in the area who were rich in experience and skills but had been left without work, I thought of having them make them': Benedetta Bruzziches speaks in her Bottega Bruzziches, the new factory inaugurated in the Caprarola industrial area, the heart of her special supply chain, which now consists of dozens of seamstresses in the area who receive the kits to sew the bags.
They then return to the Bottega for quality checks and final touches, and leave - over 10,000 a year - to reach the most famous department stores on the planet, from Harrods to Neiman Marcus, from Galeries Lafayette to Selfridges, but also the most sophisticated boutiques, from Antonia in Milan to Joyce in Hong Kong.
In front of the Bottega's entrance are hectares of hazelnut groves, trees that have marked the evolution and for many years determined the wealth of the area's farmers. But now the system is in deep crisis, due to climate change that is drastically decreasing production. Many young people are leaving, and in the tufa villages they are waiting for the government to include Tuscia in the Zes, the Special Economic Zones, with the support measures that would follow.
"I receive many requests to work with us, especially because what we do, a product of the hands, which comes from contact and the passage between thought and hands, is very satisfying. Giving back space to true craftsmanship, made of history, culture, the identity of a territory, is also crucial for the fashion system right now. People are looking for authenticity, dignity, objects made with head and heart'. This is why Benedetta has decided to call her most precious bags 'object d'hearts': the models that have made her famous, worn by stars on the red carpet of the Met Gala (e.g. Anne Hathaway and Sarah Jessica Parker) as well as on Oscar night (by Francesca Scorsese, daughter of director Martin), are made of a hand-sewn crystal mesh, just as hand-sewn is the silk lining, purchased from Tessitura Attilio Imperiali in Como; a goldsmith's workshop in Arezzo takes care of the most precious details; the metal clutches are also carved from unique blocks and made with special moulds; the methacrylate bags, sculpted into metaphysical shapes, are produced by a company in Pomezia and dyed using a process Benedetta learned in a historic button factory in the area, which before closing left its legacy to this young, fast-developing company.
