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Italy - Usually just one room, occasionally with a back room for storage, the bottega is any Italian artisan's workshop and store. All cobblers, framers, metalsmiths, carpenters, jewelers, leather workers, etc., have their own bottega, and they usually live right above it.
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Traditionally, one would apprentice under a master craftsman and thus the know-how was handed down through the generations. As many bottegari (meaning botteghe owners, or craftsmen) will be quick to point out however, the system has broken down under pressure from large department stores and readily available, mass-produced imported goods. The work is no longer cost effective, and so the current generation of apprentices have not lined up to guarantee continuity of the trades.
Although the big retailers certainly are a reality, if you look carefully you can see an interesting form of evolution of the old crafts taking place. Young artisans are reinventing the trades. They are literally setting up shop, botteghe of their own, creating high-end, hand-made, unique products for the international markets combining the know-how of old with contemporary Italian design. These next-generation botteghe are indication that while much changes, not all is lost.
So is "the only constant, constant change"? We will let you decide. From now on once a week we will feature one bottega and the artisan behind it, alternating between the old and the new forms, the traditional and the contemporary. We hope you will enjoy this series.
--contributed by GB (see bio), owner of Welcome Home, quality expatriate housing in Rome since 1984.
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