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It was 1850, when Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour officiall

y

opened, by Royal decree, the Piedmontese quarries at th

e

foot of Monte Rosa

.

They are precious quarries, whose clays, already used for

the construction of various artifacts of the Roman Empire,

seem to have also been chosen by Leonardo Da Vinci, in

the Milanese years, for the preparation of his colors

.

And how not to mention Alessandro Antonelli, who to reac

h

the 121 meters of the dome of San Gaudenzio, still today

the tallest brick building in the world, relies on the sam

e

earth to forge the bricks which, as Sebastiano Vassall

i

writes: "He chose them and touch each other one b

y

one to hear the sound "

But why are the clays of the Upper Piedmont so high

performing? These deposits are located at the foot o

f

Monte Rosa, a very large and very ancient supervolcano;

the largest in Europe.This very ancient volcano collapsed

with the formation of the Alpine chain and saw its slopes

slide 90

° , unearthing what was anciently at the bottom of

its caldera. This particular geological event left such a

n

important heritage that it was recognized by UNESCO an

d

included in the "UNESCO Global Geoparks" project.

In this territory, within the Sesia Val Grande Geopark, our

clays are quarried, an area so diverse that it counts, even

at a distance of a few kilometers, deposits with very different

technical characteristics and chromaticity.

We never use a single clay, but we work with real recipes,

tested and improved over the years, made up of precis

e

percentages of different clays, chosen and dosed accordin

g

to their technical and chromatic characteristics.

No traditional terracotta is made with this type of ra

w

material, and this is one of the fundamental aspects tha

t

gives CottoZero its compactness and resistance an

d

distinguishes it from any other terracotta on the market.