Terre di Toscana

The Association for the promotion of ceramics

Terre di Toscana (Tuscan towns and their surroundings) are known all over the world for their special blend of natural beauty with beauty created by clever and skillful transformation of the territory by its people. However, this land and its people are not known only for important works of art and architecture, or for their landscape of extraordinary beauty. The marriage between natural environment and hard work, where this work is imbued with genius and creativity, can give birth to manufacture of great artistic value: majolica, terracotta and porcelain. The ancient art of modelling clay, giving it shape
and combining colour and decoration with an idea and generally making an object out of sheer intuition, has become a real and proper cultural tradition, as well as a productive and artistic vocation in this area. This is how our manufactured objects have evolved from everyday utensils and market goods to being works of true cultural value from a Tuscany which is known and appreciated all over the world.

Associazione Terre di Toscana was created in 1999 through an initial agreement between cities with an ancient tradition in ceramics (Montelupo Fiorentino, Impruneta and Sesto Fiorentino) in order to promote and enhance their territory and earthenware, be it ceramics, terracotta or porcelain, through a joint effort in cultural, economic and tourism sectors. Both the shared history of these towns as well their individual differences have played a fundamental part in widening the base of this common strategy.
The setting up of this association has been a very important step towards demonstrating a willingness on the part of these local governments to shed lustre on their heritage to promote development, conferring on local authorities an important and decisive role in a serious policy to improve the local economy.
This first step has served to make us realize that by working together we could be more influential in demonstrating this tie between culture and economy which promotes the image of Tuscany all over the world. It has also shown that our traditions, however different in the past, would help to give full value to the Tuscan culture of “savoir faire”.

After a few years, considering the widespread existence of a variety of traditions in ceramics throughout the region, we decided to encourage further cooperation, share strategies and submit projects together with all local administrations in
Tuscany which share these economic and cultural ties.
Associazione Terre di Toscana has increased the number of its members and projects. The founding member towns have now been joined by Borgo San Lorenzo (in the province of Florence), Montopoli in Val d’Arno and Vicopisano (in the province of Pisa), Montepulciano, Trequanda and Asciano (in the province of Siena), Anghiari (in the province of Arezzo) and Carmignano (in the province of Prato). Other towns are planning to join too.

From the very beginning the Tuscan regional authorities have shown considerable interest and have offered help in many ways to the various initiatives of our association. With this help and cooperation many important events have been organized, both in Italy and abroad.
This web site volume is not only a guide or a visiting card to make people more familiar with the traditional ceramic work in our region. It represents the beginning of a shared plan to promote the extraordinary image of this beautiful and industrious Tuscany. This image is now part of the collective conscious, both in Italy and the rest of the world.

     Cesare Baccetti
President of Associazione Terre di Toscana