Carpegna / 15 September 2026

 

The first time I went to Carpegna was in December 2020. I had become fascinated by the idea of finding an Italian tradition of block printing. I knew and loved the work done in India, but I wanted to learn more about the hand-printing workshops that still existed here.

My research led me to Emanuele Francioni and Antica Stamperia Carpegna. I wrote to him and asked if I could visit. I persuaded two of my children to come with me, and we set off by car through the cold and fog.

Carpegna is a small town in the Montefeltro, in the Marche region of central Italy. Emanuele’s workshop belongs to a tradition also found across neighbouring Romagna: cloth printed by hand using carved wooden blocks. His family has practised the craft for six generations. The older blocks in the workshop sit among those made more recently; all are part of a living place of work.

 

 

I had arrived with a simple idea. I wanted to make blocks for a new Morpho + Luna Home collection, using our own flowers and butterflies. A few months later, we had our first hand-printed linens. Emanuele and I kept talking and working together after that first project.

 

 

For years, another thought stayed with me. This printing method had traditionally been used on substantial fabrics such as linen and hemp. What would happen if we tried it on wool? Could it work on silk?

There was no quick answer. This latest collection took many trials with different fabrics and colours, and many conversations about what was and was not working. Claudia, from our team, followed its development closely with Emanuele. He brought his experience to each new test, along with the curiosity to try something he had not done in quite this way before.

 

 

For the finished pieces, Emanuele carved wooden blocks from our designs. He then printed the fabric by hand, placing each impression in turn. It is careful, physical work. When you look closely at the cloth, you can see slight changes from one impression to the next. I love that each piece carries a record of how it was made.

This September, we travelled back to Carpegna to photograph the collection at the workshop. The journey felt familiar, but we were arriving with something new: the silk and wool pieces that had once been little more than a question we had asked Emanuele.

 

 

The work is only one part of what brings us back. There are the conversations over coffee, the tests that lead to another idea, and the friendship that has grown over nearly six years. Emanuele and I have even discovered a shared love of horses. Getting to know the person and the place has become inseparable from making the collection.

I am very happy that we can finally share these pieces. They began with a journey in the fog, and they have been shaped by many visits, many experiments and Emanuele’s hands.

Cécile