Crespi d'Adda is a village in northern Italy and hamlet (frazione) of Capriate San Gervasio, a municipality in the province of Bergamo, Lombardy. It is a historic settlement and an outstanding example of the 19th and early 20th-century "company towns" built in Europe and North America by enlightened industrialists to meet the workers' needs. The site is still intact and is partly used for industrial purposes, although changing economic and social conditions now threaten its survival. Since 1995 it has been on UNESCO's list of World Heritage Sites.

History

19th century

thumb|left|Crespi's Castle

In 1869 Cristoforo Benigno Crespi, a textile manufacturer from Busto Arsizio (Varese), bought the valley between the rivers Brembo and Adda, to the south of Capriate, with the intention of installing a cotton mill on the banks of the Adda.

Cristoforo Crespi introduced the most modern spinning, weaving and finishing processes in his Cotton Mill. The hydroelectric power plant in Trezzo, on the Adda river just a few kilometers upwards, was built up around 1906 for the manufacturer Cristoforo Benigno Crespi. The settlement which was built in 1878 next to the cotton-mill was a village, a residential area provided with social services such as a clinic, a school building, a theatre, a cemetery, a wash-house and a church.

Both the town and the factory were illuminated thanks to electric light. The village of Crespi d'Adda was the first village in Italy to have modern public lighting. The workers houses, of English inspiration, are lined up in order along parallel roads to the east of the factory. The whole architecture and town planning (except the first spinning department, created by engineer Angelo Colla), was submitted to the architect Ernesto Pirovano. For about fifty years Pirovano, helped by the engineer Pietro Brunati, ran the construction of the village.

Geography

The village is located by the eastern shore of the river Adda, next to the provincial borders of Bergamo with Milan, south of Capriate San Gervasio. Other nearest settlements are Trezzo sull'Adda, Brembate, Vaprio d'Adda and Canonica d'Adda. It is from Bergamo and its airport, from Monza and from Milan. Nearest motorway exit, "Capriate", is north and is part of the A4 motorway Turin-Trieste.

Monuments and Places of Interest

Religious Architecture

thumb|Parish church

The parish church was built starting from 1891 under the direction of the engineer Pietro Brunati and it was opened in November 1893 with the inauguration by the bishop Gaetano Camillo Guindani. The church is the reconstruction of the Marian shrine in Busto Arsizio. The church was dedicated to S.Maria dell'Aiuto and dates back to 1517. The designer is unknown, but some important architects and sculptors, such as Lonati and Tommaso Rodari, worked on it.

The parish church in Crespi d'Adda has a square plan with a base made up with Adda strain and it ends with a large octagonal dome externally surrounded by a white marble loggia.

The manor house was the summer residence of the family. With Silvio Crespi there was an enlargement of the factory, thanks to the project made by Pietro Brunati, and there was a new inauguration in 1894 at the presence of Queen Margherita. The new productive lines began to work systematically in 1896. This factory was the centre of the village and all the inhabitants worked there. The factory was the working core of the village and the life of the workers depended on the factory production. Every person in the village had his own house and they were all the same, except for the managers, the doctor and the priest who had more luxurious ones. Initially, in the project of Cristoforo Crespi, there was no idea of a hierarchy, but the situation developed because the social environment of the time changed and showed different levels of wealth.

Today the factory is an open air museum of industrial archeology.

thumb|Workers' houses

See also

  • Model village
  • Derwent Valley Mills, a similar World Heritage Site in Derbyshire, England whose first cotton mill was built in 1771.

References

  • Crespi d'Adda website
  • Villaggio Crespi (Crespi Workers' Village)
  • Crespi d'Adda UNESCO - The official website
  • Official Unesco Photo gallery