Fondazione Antonio Ratti, a journey of knowledge through fabrics, art and stories of value.

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The spaces of Villa Sucota host the headquarters of the Antonio Ratti Foundation, which can also be reached via the suggestive route of the Kilometer of Knowledge.

Born in 1985 from the desire of Antonio Ratti not only to transform his deep passion for art and textile into an active reality in the world of culture, but also to fulfill his wish to give back to his city and to all those who had drawn inspiration from it, what had been until that moment a private collection. The Foundation, today chaired by Annie Ratti, has thus become a place of artistic and cultural study, promotion and experimentation open to all.

The FAR holds the collection of ancient fabrics collected by Antonio Ratti over the course of his life. Over 40,000 pieces and 1500 sample books, spanning centuries and cultures ranging from archaeological fabrics to the experiments of the twentieth century.

Aware of how a successful industrial production always needs a strong cultural base, Antonio Ratti has promoted the textile in all its forms, from the attention to history and tradition in the different cultures of the world, to the vision both technological and geopolitical of new productive frontiers.

 

 

 

Fondazione Antonio Ratti’s textile collections

“Culture means entrusting to critical knowledge and transformation the immobility of what we inherit from the past and the present” (Antonio Ratti, 1990)

Aware that a successful industrial production cannot do without a strong cultural basis, Antonio Ratti promotes the textile world in all forms, from an attention to history and tradition in the various cultures of the world to a focus on the vision of new productive, technological and geopolitical frontiers.

With the Foundation, he creates a place to allow the community to benefit from his immense and valuable textile heritage, offering students, creative minds and Ratti’s customers the chance to come into contact with the over 400,000 antique fabrics he has collected.

From the Kuba fabrics of the Republic of Congo to the velvets of the Tuscan Renaissance, from the Coptic fragments of the Third century to the brocades of the French eighteenth century, from Indian and European cashmere shawls to the pattern books of companies of the Twentieth century, the textile collections of Fondazione Antonio Ratti are the expression of centuries of textile history and come from the most remote parts of the world. They are a source of study, knowledge and interpretation of the present.

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Fondazione Antonio Ratti is the concrete expression of a passion, the portrait of a patron, a unique place in Italy able to combine textiles and art, research and experimentation. A visit to Fondazione Antonio Ratti represents an exciting journey through historical periods, geographies, languages and works of art.

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Fondazione Antonio Ratti