UMBRIAN EXCELLENCE – EDOARDO AND MATTIA: “THIS IS HOW WE REDISCOVERED SAFFRON FOR COSMETIC USE IN ANCIENT TEMPLAR RECIPES”
FROM PERUGIATODAY.IT A GLIMPSE INTO THE COMPANY THAT MAKES COSMETICS FROM NATURAL PRODUCTS OF EXCELLENCE
A story about study, recovery of the ancient and the products of nature that constitute the real “gold” of this region.
Edoardo and Mattia’s adventure began with agricultural studies and a reflection on saffron, but not for the established food and culinary context since the market is saturated, but for cosmetics, “transferring its properties from the well-being of the palate to that of the person.”
Thus began a collaboration with scholars and researchers aimed at rediscovering and enhancing a much sought-after local product that connotes the history of the Perugian and Umbrian territory.
“We put together our knowledge of agriculture,” Mattia says, “with that of a biochemist, and from the laboratory came the first experiments and we put together the first formulations. The products were given on trial to some beauty salons, with excellent feedback.”
Home production of saffron in Ponte Felcino, in collaboration with the Faculty of Agriculture, has led to the rediscovery of the qualities of this spice “for personal care also possesses the spirituality of its land, an afflatus of genuineness and philosophical mysticism that recalls a human reading of divine perfection depositary of the golden rule, also adopted by the Knights Templar (hence the name) who in places made the cultivation and application of saffron’s benefits their own,” Mattia says further, speaking of Templarea, the line of locally produced cosmetic products through a laboratory in Calvi dell’Umbria.
“We provide recipes and raw materials and think about marketing. In three years we have become a real company, selling at fairs and markets and in stores and beauty centers,” Mattia continues. “We have also developed a secondary line with honey, propolis and beeswax, all produced locally by a beekeeper in Pilonico Paterno. Finally, the processing waste from this line is used by Alessandra Paris of EssenziAle to produce a line of candles.”
Mattia and Edoardo’s production consists of 400 saffron creams and 250 propolis-honey (creams, lip butter and body butter), various balms, olive oil soap line and beeswax.
The name and logo come from research on the Knights Templar, harking back “to an image in nature of petals and pistils, a balanced expression of an axiom that goes in tune with the historical legacy of the Templars themselves, who in this very land left their art and monastic value, cultivating and using saffron even for the cure of the plague, on local history, saffron against the plague used of the Templars in their hospitals,” Mattia concludes.
Templarea products and EssenziAle candles will be on the market stalls in Perugia’s Piccinino Square on Dec. 4.