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The Montgolfier brothers, inventors of the first balloon to transport people, could never have imagined it: the hot air balloon experience is still one of the most impressive for gliding through the sky. One of the best places to enjoy the magic of the landscape seen from above is the Göreme Valley in the unique historical region of Cappadocia. Declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1985, it is dotted with rocks of volcanic origin and religious architecture from pre-Christian times weathered by the ravages of time. The result is a surreal landscape. Impossible to distinguish myth from fairytale, not even the multifaceted forms carved into the rock, rebaptised the ‘fairy chimneys’, where the earth meets the sky, offer a solution. To enjoy the magnificence of the scenery, it is possible to take advantage of the bright morning light or the warm hues of sunset. To accompany the thrill of the flight, we refer to a legend in the world of eyewear: the aviator models once designed for pilots, still capable of surprising in the reinterpretations in the Marcolin collections. Combining a classic with contemporary design details.

Once upon a time there was the Habsburg Empire, the year was 1857. The inauguration of the line from Vienna to Trieste, the most important outlet on the Adriatic Sea, transformed the missing link into what would go down in history as the southern railway line and go on to enable the aristocracy south of the empire to land on the shores of the Adriatic, revitalising trade on both routes. Today, that railway line’s historic network has been restored, making it possible to reach Vienna from Trieste along the old route. This is slow travel. Watching the landscapes pass by, starting from the shores of Istria of yesteryear, across the rugged mountain ridge of the Simmering and then up through Styria, always window-side are the sights you will see under the lenses of your glasses. If art and culture are on your agenda this summer, once you arrive in Vienna, the highlight is the Austrian National Library, with its Gala Hall: you will not have access to the over 200,000 volumes on display, but you will be able to admire the baroque splendour of the court library, one of the most beautiful in the world. We suggest graduating the experience through understated, elegant frames, the result of the time-forged expertise of the Marcolin brand.

Cherchez la femme! urged Alexandre Dumas père, in his novel Les Mohicans de Paris, to imply that women are the direct or indirect cause of events, even if these events are apparently unrelated to the women in question. With the Women’s World Cup coming into full swing this August in Australia and New Zealand, we turn to Oceania. Following the Italian national team is an opportunity to travel around the Australian continent chasing waves, heading for beaches whose miles of sand or rocks make them a surfers’ paradise. For the more experienced, equipped with the best lenses to shield their eyes from the sun’s rays and wrap-around silhouettes to protect them from the water and salt, Marcolin sets up a rendezvous at Bells Beach, the birthplace of surfing in Australia and the setting for Point Break, the cult film for lovers of the most spectacular water sport ever. For mere inquisitive onlookers, however, there is the Australian National Surfing Museum and Hall of Fame near the beach to trace the history of surfing and its most iconic boards.

To define the craftsmanship of a pair of glasses from a literary point of view, we could use the narrative point of view as a term of comparison since, depending on the angle from which one chooses to tell a story, this captures different cues and emotions from the subject of the storyline. A company like Marcolin is measured by the meticulousness and care of its production: the quality of the materials, the creativity of the design and the manufacturing expertise speak of a dedication to its uniqueness. This dedication mirrors the stories selected. Each book is a miniature collection of stories linked by a point of view that has the construction or discovery of strong, authentic characters at its heart: beyond the glitz and the glory, like the protagonists of the stories in Vite minuscole [Small Lives] by Pierre Michon, a classic from the 1980s, which launched a first-time author into the literary fold by virtue of the power of his language. The need to meet one’s destiny is echoed by Francesca D’Aloja’s Spiriti [Spirits], not as phantasmagorical entities but as enlightened people committed to being fully themselves. Adding historical context to a novel with a compelling narrative structure are the four different points of view that unravel through the pages of Trust by Hernan Diaz. Discovering the face of a woman who has remained in the shadows of history is their mission.

The style of a pair of glasses conveys the personality of the wearer. Defining its tone and calibrating its timbre is, likewise, the purpose of a narrative voice. What defines the style of a Marcolin collection with a distinct contemporary twist? That ability to dose practicality and uniqueness by refining a detail, which, like the narrative voice of the protagonist of a story, can precisely convey the coordinates of a storyline or a feeling. For this reason, our selection has given voice to poets. First and foremost, to that of Antonia Pozzi, as a sculptor of the soul, who expresses her deepest voice with the delicacy of a young bird on its first flight in her collection of love poems entitled Poesie d’amore. And if you are eager to tune in to the tones and vibrations of someone who has long sought the deep voice of the narrator’s self not only between the pages of her stories, but also travelling through Europe in search of a writer who voluntarily eclipsed herself from the world, Nome in codice: Elitar I. Sulle tracce di Milan Kundera [Code Name Elitar I. In the Footsteps of Milan Kundera] by well-known French journalist Ariane Chemin will take you on a journey through a nostalgic Europe full of fervour. If you want to bet on a letter, as the gambler does on the colour, then there is Kappa: volume 6 is dedicated to Magic, in its different meanings.

For sailors about to set sail or simply ready to relax the pace to fully enjoy the beginning of August. There is no journey without movement. Whether it is a motion of the heart, an inspiration or a carefree wander through towns and cities, familiar or unfamiliar places, the combination in question brings together the daring. The colours that of the eyewear, in Marcolin’s collections are its outfit. And in these capacities, we offer two readings: Come ti vesti [How You Dress] by Andrea Batilla, and A Manchester con gli Smith, un walkabout musicale, [In Manchester with the Smiths, A Musical Walkabout] by Giuseppina Borghese, because every outfit you wear needs a soundtrack to accompany it.

No foreign literary work has contributed as much to building an imaginary of our country as the famous Italian Journey by the prolific German scholar J. W. Von Goethe, who travelled through Italy between 1786 and 1788, portraying it as an ideal place of beauty, suspended between the Eden-like dimension of its landscapes and the sublime inspiration of its art. It was not until the 1980s that this zeitgeist was transcended into matter. And while it is true that a decade later, the rock band Afterhours were singing that “You can’t get out alive from the 80s”, it was precisely in those years that Italy came back to the fore with a new identity: bold, industrious and organised with a production system recognised for its high quality and unmistakable style. The ‘Made in Italy’ concept, which took off in those years, decreed the success of an exquisitely Italian heritage, in many respects.

There were four categories that defined the identity of an entire country: clothing, agri-food, furniture and automobiles. The designers who championed the ‘Made in Italy’ concept the most include the genius that was Gianfranco Ferré, known for the harmonious volumes of his creations, celebrated for the impeccable style of his pinstripe suits and for turning the shirt into a fetish. The women he imagined for his creations, at a time when the euphoria of prosperity was often overshadowed by superficial appearances, alluded to the rediscovery of their power. Women could aspire to top roles in society. Hence the formal style accompanied by the bold nature of their accessories. Retro forays into eyewear had feminine shapes: cat-eye and elongated, but also slightly trapezoidal, in both dark and coloured tones, the influences of which follow one another in the thread of the story, from the temples to the lenses, in certain collections produced by Marcolin.

It is not only the title of one of the most significant short stories by Stephen King, the king of thrillers, published in Italy in 1981, that links the last gasps of the 1970s to the new era. The zeitgeist comes in wearing full revival silhouettes: these include the iconic round, coloured or tortoiseshell glasses inspired by Andy Warhol, appearing in the brightly coloured magazines, film sets and city streets of the West and of Italy full of ardour, as well as the famous teardrop lenses which made a comeback thanks to the films of an era seductive in terms of aesthetics and storylines. And it is with this spirit, conjuring up pages from books, archive footage and films, that Marcolin gave a voice to these atmospheres in its collections.

This is what we could call the themes, like the echoes of the famous (star) wars by director George Lucas, that marked the decade: amidst new intergalactic and imaginary spaces to be explored, political and social revolutions that defined its contours through the renewal of taste and lifestyle of an era that was revolutionary in many ways. This turmoil, which was linked to the revolutions of the previous decade through a contradictory sense of defeat and victory at the same time by those involved in the counterculture, rediscovered an individualism that tended to express itself in eccentricities: from the serial and irreverent art of Andy Warhol to the disturbing sounds of Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground, through to Elton John and David Bowie, who with unparalleled originality sang of the unknown of another space beyond the earth. And in terms of design, how did this turmoil permeate everyday spaces and accessories? Through a revolution of taste with unequivocal intent.

The identity of the decade shifted from the world of ideas to the world of design with a significant post-modern twist. It was the clean, essential lines of the world of objects, particularly those relating to lighting – with the consecration of the immaculate white pendant lamps – that were juxtaposed with imaginative, typically optical effects, the result of influences from the world of psychedelia still in vogue, characterising the geometric shapes of the brightly coloured wallpapers that decorated homes. The destiny of colours seemed tied in with that of shapes artfully constructed to deceive the eye: optical art, which originated at the end of the 1960s, developed and found the best framework to express itself in the decade that followed, combining two colours in particular: black and white, the matching of which gave way to its most congenial use in fashion and accessories. The mood board of this style, with its nods to science fiction, also through the use of oversized glasses with a printed effect, is well captured in the video clip created by Jack Whiteley and Laura Brownhill for the song Bennie and The Jets, by Elton John, who at that time was intent on carving out a place for himself in the temple of style: performing in front of an audience with flashy sunglasses, richly decorated even at sunset, becoming a viaticum for the iconography of an era. But it was the boldly shaped and brightly coloured glasses that best represented the ironic and eagerly light-hearted tones of that current of taste, the offspring of those flowers we all know, which helped give a new impetus to the objects and interior design of the period. The close link claimed by the revival of oriental philosophies and the need for a sense of wellbeing linked to a state of nature is imbued with the trend that still influences Marcolin’s most glamorous and luxury collections, with their bold shapes and pastel colours.

Just like designers of the decade, turning to new shapes and materials. From pop culture and the world of animation came mouths, hands, vegetables to be transformed into the most eclectic of seats. From the desire to experiment, however, came the need to focus on new materials. Even controversial ones. This is not the case with foam rubber – the forerunner of polyurethane foam – but with plastic, regarding the use of which the two opposite poles of the counterculture clashed: the hippy one, which abhorred the very word because “…plastic was used for mass-produced objects, easy to manipulate and lacking in authenticity. Plastic people had the same attributes,” as Ken Goffman wrote in his book Counterculture Through the Ages. In contrast, for Warhol, plastic possessed qualities: flexibility, mutability, variability. “In the realm of authenticity, flexibility can be suspect,” Goffman continued, pointing out the contrast in aesthetics and thinking of a highly contradictory decade, which prompted part of the hippy movement to follow Warhol’s eccentric variability, characterised by his ironic detachment. After all, the artist went down in history for being attracted by money, fame and superficial beauty.

The stories we love are usually those that we somehow consider close to our world. On the contrary, the discoveries catapult us into scenarios far removed from our own reality. And yet they captivate us. A bit like the art of Monica Sjöö, whose story offers insights into hot topics such as, above all, gender equality. This is a topic very close to Marcolin’s heart, as since its foundation, the company has been committed to supporting gender policies in the broadest sense and actions aimed at promoting a work-life balance. From the very beginning, we chose to prevent female workers first and foremost, who by choice or necessity decided to take care of their families, from leaving their jobs. Over time and as new challenges have arisen, we have set up pathways to support parenting alongside the inclusion and empowerment of women, which Sabrina Paulon, Group HR Director of Marcolin, has already talked about. The idea to tell you about The Great Cosmic Mother came about from an interregnum combining the similarities and quality of the discovery of this Swedish artist. A unique journey that brings together three inseparable and interconnected elements of Monica Sjöö’s world: art, politics and spirituality.

If the principle of all thought is measured in words, Monica’s is connected to Gaia, the spirit of the Earth, understood as the creative principle of the world, reflected in a woman’s body. It is precisely this painted idea that unites the cycles of nature with motherhood, which, descending into ritual practices close to paganism, make Monica Sjöö’s art disruptive. What she puts on stage is not a fairytale, and the canvas God Giving Birth (1968) offers up an unequivocal translation of feminist iconography: God is a woman intent on giving birth. Inspired by the experience of the birth of her second son, the work, accused of blasphemy and obscenity, goes on to be censored and removed wherever it is exhibited. Today, it is part of a collection of 50 works, including the mystical suggestions of large canvases and wall paintings, as well as the protest posters that accompanied the artist on her environmental and peace marches as early as the late 1960s.

Like many artists, Monica Sjöö experienced a personal parable that led her beyond the confines of home. Born in Härnösand, in the Swedish county of Västernorrland in 1938, she found her way to emancipation in Bristol, where she moved after meeting her British future husband, Stevan Trickey, in Paris. The traumatic experience of giving birth to their first child in a Swedish hospital was a subject of personal exploration until the catharsis of the birth of her other two children in the more reassuring confines of her home. In Bristol, in 1964, Monica exhibited her first abstract canvases, thus initiating her commitment to feminist and pacifist movements. It was a rite of passage that brought her into contact with the civilised and radical circles of her time: from the protests against the war in Vietnam through the liberation marches of the women’s movements, which saw the freedom of the individual, regardless of sex, gender or class, as an inalienable right. The exhibition documented the artist’s all-round commitment, delivering to the public the portrait of a woman whose art is poetic, controversial and never banal, radical and poignant – like the canvas to which she entrusts her grief over the death of her youngest son, Lament for my Young Son, the first of a long series – and forces reflection. The Moderna Museet in Stockholm, in collaboration with Modern Art Oxford, has established a common thread between Monica Sjöö’s ecologist and feminist action and the contemporary Fridays for Future movement, created by another, much better-known Swede, Greta Thunberg. Due to its topics and original narrative, the exhibition could not leave a company like Marcolin indifferent. You have until 15 October to see it in Stockholm.