Our studio is based in Acquaviva delle Fonti, a little town of the Metropolitan City of Bari, Apulia, Southern Italy. Founded in the Middle Ages, Acquaviva gets its name from the groundwater layer which has attracted over the centuries the population of the “Siticulosa Apulia” described by Horace. The underground water, which you can “spy” from the wells of the historic centre, has made this land fertile and still gives the famous Red (purple) Onion its typical sweet and fresh taste: its production is very limited (less than 300 tons per year) because its cultivation still uses traditional and rudimentary methods in order to preserve the aroma and the fragrance.

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The religious heritage is evident in the charming little churches in every alley of the Old Town, in the celebrations in honour of the Virgin Mary culminating with the traditional launch of the hot-air balloon, and in the Cathedral, with its beautiful rose window and the sumptuous silver altars in the crypt. In the same square, just opposite the Cathedral, the secular counterpart Palazzo de Mari, a former Norman castle, then home of the Genoese family of bankers De Mari, and Town Hall today.

In Piazza Vittorio Emanuele stands the only stone Cassarmonica in central-southern Italy (on top photo): it hosts the performances of the town band, founded in 1797, which has won several awards, even in Istanbul and Stockholm. The town also features the most important astronomical observatory in Apulia.

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