Good Things From Italy - Le Cose Buone d'Italia

Founded in 1264, Fabriano remains the European leader in paper production

It is undeniable that “very few companies can claim a longer or distinguished heritage than Fabriano”. This extraordinary Italian paper mill was founded in 1264, at a time in which its fine arts papers were used and praised by the Renaissance icon Michelanglo Buonarroti. However, Michelangelo was not the only celebrity with a weakness for Fabriano paper. The German composer Ludwig van Beethoven was also a great fan of Fabriano [...]

To celebrate its 750th birthday, Fabriano just published a new book “Cotone, Conigli e invisibili segni d’acqua. 750 anni di storia della carta Fabriano” (In English, Rags, Rabbit Skins and Invisible Watermarks. 750 years of papermaking in Fabriano). The book, edited by Chiara Medioli, whole reenacting the history of this prestigious paper mill, puts a lot of emphasis on materials and technologies involved in paper production. Indeed, “Cotone” reminds about the materials origianlly used to produce paper; “conigli” about the special glue Fabriano experts created using rabbits’ skin to strengthen paper resistance, and “acqua” about the fact that we can’t have paper without water.

Italians were the first to deliberately induce effervescence in their winemaking, despite the practice commonly being misattributed to the French Benedictine monk, Dom Pérignon. Contrary to popular myth, at one time an important part of his job as cellar master at the Abbey Saint-Pierre d’Hautvilliers, was to prevent a secondary fermentation in the juice under his watch.

Although fizziness in wine has been noted as far back as ancient Greek and Roman times, the first written account of its intentional creation was in 1622 by Francesco Scacchi, an Italian monk and physician from Fabriano. In his work, De Salubri potu dissertatio, he described adding sugar to wine to create bubbles, then conjectured whether they were good or bad for one’s health, including spiritual. [...]