In the heart of Florence’s city center sits a hidden urban garden where flowerbeds and apricot blossoms perfume the air. The urban idyll is the work of architect Giacomo Salizzoni, who cultivated the Orti Dipinti garden for ten years and built it into a space for the neighborhood denizens. On the site of an abandoned running track hidden behind a tree-line in a community park, residents helped Salizzoni transform it into a botanical oasis while learning about the healing properties of Madonna’s wort and virtues of earthworm composting along the way. When Il Bisonte CEO Luigi Ceccon caught wind of Salizzoni’s community-building in the city the leather goods company calls home, he knew he had to get involved.
“For years on Il Bisonte’s journal we’ve been telling stories of heroes all over the world who are fighting to change the future of the planet and its people,” says Ceccon. “And now we’ve discovered that one of them is actually quite nearby, so we’ve decided to share Giacomo’s story and also, simply, to be a part of it.” So Ceccon invested in the garden’s infrastructure with significant financial support, including the education of its board of directors and many volunteers by fostering the skills necessary to self-manage the garden and its programming. The brand will also support Salizzoni’s mission to erect a greenhouse so children and adults can visit no matter the weather.
