There is a shop in Varese where Alice would feel wonderful, leaving her enchanted world for a moment to take a look at the latest creations from Paris, at the suggestions that come from India, at the colorful dresses ready-to-wearto ceramic jewellery rakuto papier-mâché earrings similar to large precious stones.
It is called “Calicò” and has been showing its splendid and creative shop window since July 1998, in via Carrobbio 15between one lowered shutter and another, but the cotton thread that characterizes the fabric from which it takes its name is resistant and ancient, comes from the Indian city of Calicut and he bewitched Cristina Insalaco, a failed architect (with all her exams finished) but a woman of infinite imagination and sympathy.
«The calico it is a light and crinkly raw cotton, it was used for petticoats and in the 19th century for women’s underwear. I love India, where it comes from, and fabrics, and so I gave the shop this name. I had finished my exams and to support my studies I was working in a costume jewelery shop in Piazza Lima in Milan. I was supposed to help the owner over the Christmas period, but then she left me the keys and went away for two months, so I became passionate about work and, upon returning to Varese, I thought about opening my own businessafter reading about the “Occasion” of the availability of this space”, explains Cristina, with magnetic green eyes and aallure decidedly Parisian.
«At the beginning I offered costume jewelery and bags and hats made by myself, then I started going to Paris at Christmas to visit the fairs and wholesalers in the center, and get inspiration for my models, in addition to purchasing products that were unique at the time, you could only find them there. Today this is no longer the case, unfortunately, even in the Ville lumière the items made in China have arrived.”
The Carrobbio shop, a street unfortunately marred by the closure of several businesses, from the historic butcher’s shop to the two-bar tobacconist’s, is a colorful lighta meeting point for those who love good taste and imagination, because at “Calicò” every object is particular and unique, from necklaces with fabric flowers to ceramic jewelery rakuto the rings and bracelets with Byzantine shapes arrived from Turkey, to the phantasmagoric earrings inspired by aperitifs, with micro glasses and straw and names ranging from “Spritz” to “Blue Angel” or “Gin Tonic”.
«All jewelry is made by mein this period I propose necklaces with thermoadhesive designs and decorations that are usually “glued” onto sweaters. Then whole dresses, skirts and t-shirts, I collaborate with an Italian-Indian company that produces hand-printed fabrics with wooden moldscolor by color.”
The shop it’s sort of atelier expanded, because other creative minds collaborate with Cristina Insalacolike the ceramist Giovanna Zighetti, and Sara and Maria Francesca of the “Tana delle Costruzioni” of Vedano Olona.
«I get the parts from them raku to create my creations, while with Giovanna we also give life to ceramic figures such as little angels. In the past I collaborated for a long time with Rina Galimberti, a great glass and felt artist, to create highly original necklaces. Then I often work with Cristina Marzaro, owner of the “Colorphylla” brand, who creates wonderful dresses printed with leaves and colored only with natural essences, such as walnut husk, indigo, Compec wood used by the Aztecs, or turmeric. With her and the “Tana delle Costruzioni” I organized a fashion show at the Caffè Lucioni in Castiglione Olona, presenting my jewels combined with “natural” clothes».
The clientele of “Calicò” is varied: «They range from little girls to grandmothers, and sometimes young people “dare” less than their parents, who instead are curious about wearing unusual and perhaps slightly bizarre jewels or clothes. In my small shop, however, there is an extra chair, for those who want to stop and chat, and I must say that many of my strongest friendships were born exactly like this.”
Cristina’s latest creations they are the sentences to hang from the ceiling or on a glass, a long thread with beads and words, haiku, poems, aphorisms, and the free suction cupor. And as a final motto, here is a “talking thread” from the great designer Bruno Munari, which summarizes the intentions of those who made imagination the very essence of life: «When someone says: “I can do this too”, he means say he knows how to DO it AGAIN. Otherwise he would have already done it before.”
