URBINO - Flavio Di Paoli’s passion for fashion started way back when, as a child, he would ask his seamstress aunt to make him clothes.
“They were whimsical patterns,” he recalls, amused.
“I liked to dress differently from others. I would explain to my aunt what I wanted.
“I would make her do impossible things.”
Years later, Di Paoli, a native of Urbino, began making clothes for others.
After graduating from the Institute of Art he enrolled in the Faculty of Fashion, where he became a master of cutting and sewing during the four-year course that resulted in a master’s degree in 2015.
That same year he started putting on his first fashion shows.
Since 2004, Di Paoli has been a member of the organising committee for the Duke’s Festival in Urbino, a Renaissance city and UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The festival takes place every year in the historic centre to evoke the city’s former splendour during Duke Federico III of Montefeltro’s reign.
With the palace, squares and alleys, the city of Urbino comes to life with a historical market and reenactors who, to the rhythm of drums, parade through the streets dressed in clothes inspired by the time.
“I am in charge of managing the reenactors and making the costumes. For the last edition I sewed about 60,” Di Paoli explains.
There are 13 board members in all, but the practical organisation of the event mainly involves six.
That’s a big commitment for Di Paoli, who, while devoting a lot of his energy to the festival and its costumes, simultaneously manages the housewares store he inherited from his father.
“In the dead moments when no one comes in, I go in the back and create,” he explains.
Making historical clothes is a complex affair, involving more than just creativity and skill in cutting fabric or sewing them together - it requires study and dedication.
“I learned the history of art over the years,” he says.
“I then delved into the history of costume, but above all I had to carefully study the paintings, to know how specific figures of the duchy dressed.
“I devoted myself to the works of Piero della Francesca and Raphael Sanzio,” referencing artists who symbolised the Renaissance and promoted Urbino culture.
“I studied the Crivelli and Urbino during the Renaissance, which is different in style from other parts of Italy.
“When I make clothes, I try to mediate by also adapting them to our use. We are not totally faithful to the costumes of the period,” reveals Di Paoli, who for his commitment and talent won the ‘Urbinate of the Year’ award a few weeks ago.
A group of reenactors at the Duke’s Festival in Urbino dressed in period clothes designed and made by Flavio Di Paoli.
“We take small liberties to make them more interesting for the audience.”
When he is not sewing historical dresses, Di Paoli lives and breathes fashion by creating futuristic pieces with unique and sophisticated shapes, working on the fabrics by hand.
“I choose a theme, develop the mood board and then design the patterns, the paper patterns and sometimes I start from there, before cutting the fabric,” he explains.
“I focus a lot on cutting the fabric by assembling various parts. I often build the dress by working directly on the model’s shape and being guided by the draping of the fabric, how it falls naturally.”
To enrich the fabrics of his collections with precious detail, Di Paoli paints them by hand, inspired by the theme of the collection.
This method also allows him to save on printing costs.
“I’m also very sensitive to the aspect of sustainability,” he says.
“The collection I’m presenting this year is at least made from 85 per cent waste materials, parts of old fabrics that I have kept and assembled.
“We are the third most polluting industry in the world, and we cannot disregard that.
“We have to get away from the logic of fast fashion,” he adds.
Between the family store and fashion, between the past of Renaissance festivals and his creations projected into the future, this gentle and determined designer works tirelessly to realise his dream of opening his own fashion house.
