Crespi d'Adda, the workers' village

As usual, early in the morning, we start from the camp of Lenno; as usual, Michele and I, we start a bit in advance. We are, in a short time, blocked in behind buses and trucks, we go away from traffic with our slim bicycles and we accelerate in a continuous up and down on the banks of the lake, up to Como. There we decide, reluctantly, to avoid the passage to the sanctuary of Ghisallo, the Madonna of cyclists, too high and too far from our route; we go straight to Capriate San Gervasio, near Bergamo, through the provinces of Monza and Milan.

Our GPS helps us find the right way, but anyway with many different towns we still managed to get lost. Forced to use the ancient orientation technique we demand to someone, actually we find a shortcut: a dirt path on a small bridge over the river Lambro, only accessible to pedestrians; we discover the secret passage and we are back on track, following the signs of the faithful navigator.

During the trip Alessandro calls us: "Hello? There’s something crappy: the window is gone". In the first few kilometers towards Como, in the gallery, the window of the "attic" above the driver’s cab broke due to a distracted closure. The two camperists must stop in Como, hoping to find a spare part in a short time. Michele and I, unable to significantly slow down, we arrive in Crespi D'Adda - our fourth Unesco site – terribly in advance, while Alessandro tells us with text messages about the evolution of the situation: there is the piece, and it has already been fixed. Now they will leave to reach us.

In the meanwhile we ride in this curious town, between the workers' houses near the factory, and at the end of the avenue we reach a cemetery, dominated by the great Crespi’s family mausoleum.

Alessandro and Marco call us again: they forgot to take the camera cover in Como and now they must go back to get it; they were almost there… We go back at the entrance of the town, in the only bar, and we have lunch with two melted ice cream. Between an ice cream and the other, a man in the table near us, Roberto, for thirty years in Crespi D'Adda, tells us about the village and about the double vision of this work. On the one hand the workers could enjoy all the services: doctor, priest, after work, education for children, maintenance of houses; on the other, the master, from his castle-mansion, aspired to an organization and absolute control of its employees. The question that arises is: Crespi d'Adda was a village on a human scale or on an enterprise scale? Of course considering the period in which it was built.

We organize the two appointments in the morning: the meeting with the mayor of Capriate San Gervasio, which includes Crespi D'Adda, and the visit with Stefano Scattini, of the association villaggiocrespi.it; two meetings to go back to the birth of the industrial age and see its implications and the legacy in the present.

The nomination as a World Heritage Site in 1995, has given greater visibility to Crespi d'Adda, requiring an even greater attention to the care of the village, which has remained almost unchanged to this day mainly because of its isolated location, in a lowland accessible only from the north, surrounded by the confluence of the rivers Brembo and Adda.

The factory was built in 1878 by Cristoforo Benigno Crespi, on the banks of the Adda, to exploit the potential of the waters. His son Silvio, back from his studies in Great Britain, wanted to do the examples tested overseas in order to have an industry more prone to the needs of the worker. In the following decades from the beginning of everything, they tried to build what was meant to be, according to the vision of Crespi, an ideal village. They built large houses with gardens, with low rental costs, they provided many free services, unthinkable in other neighboring towns, such as running water, drinkable and industrial, the seeds for the garden, education, health. They also thought to the care of the religious aspects, with the construction of an almost perfect copy of the Renaissance church of Busto Arsizio, the birthplace of the Crespi family.

And that’s how was born a village built to combine the production needs with the workers’ work dignity and life, where the employer is the owner but also the great "father" of the community.

Obviously in the late nineteenth century the differences between classes and roles were clearly visible: the Crespi emphasized their authority by building a villa, or rather a neo-medieval castle; that’s why the village was called an "industrial feud", where the life was all around the factory, and not only the buildings, but also the inhabitants were almost a private property of the employer.

After walking in this singular village, we set the camper for the travel and we leave again. Tomorrow we will have the day off, tonight Michele will ride for 35 kilometers to Milan, ensuring the continuity of our bike trip. While we wait Monday, the only day possible to visit the Cenacolo, we go see our girlfriends, always connected with the invisible thread of the "UNESCO BIKE".

<<< DO YOU WANT TO KNOW MORE ABOUT THE OTHER TOUR STAGES? CLICK HERE FOR THE REPORTAGE "UNESCO BY BIKE" >>>