Like any classic industrial hub, Como has many small companies and factories specialising in different parts of silk production. Taroni, a firm of eighty employees, weaves fabric and also screen-prints designs on that fabric. But it uses finishers and other specialists outside the company to complete production, said Maximilian Canepa, the CEO of Taroni, whose family has been in weaving for more than ten generations. “We all have similar machines, but it’s the people themselves, or the experience that comes with the people, that makes the product,” he said.

What makes Taroni stand out is that the continuity of knowledge and people has been accompanied by a continuity of tools. The factory has thirty-two shuttle looms from the 1960s as well as a handful of warping machines from the late 1950s, used for small lots of skein-dyed yarn. These older looms function alongside state-of-the-art machinery and allow Taroni to draw on its rich history; an archive of 6,000 articles and 3,000 swatches provides a deep well of inspiration.

For instance, there are certain types of yarns or designs that can only be warped on older looms but woven on modern weaving machines, and vice-versa. “Our philosophy is: yes, those machines created beautiful fabrics that we still weave today. But those machines also replaced older machines, and ended up creating new things that weren’t able to be woven before,” said Canepa. “So it’s about trying to find how to best utilise the machinery you have. Because in the end, we want to create the archives for tomorrow, not just live in the past.”

The mix of old and new tools produces unique products that are good for business, he added, “because our clients are looking for things that cannot be found anywhere else”.

THE FATE OF old looms is a recurring theme in Taroni’s history. The firm’s origins date back to the early 1900s, when Amedeo Taroni became a partner in silk-maker Mazzucchelli & Co, which then merged with other firms to form Industria Serica Taroni in 1921. Through its early decades, the company was affected by world events: an earthquake in Japan in 1923 disrupted the supply of raw material; the Great Depression depleted the market for luxury goods; and the spread of rayon put a question mark on the long-term viability of silk clothing.

After the Second World War, company bigwigs blamed the old looms for an inability to compete in a new world of mass production. Yet, by the end of the 1950s, the rise of Italian haute couture, which drew on Como’s fabulous silks, affirmed the continuing value of Taroni’s handmade products. (Taroni finally retired its 1920s jacquard looms in the late 1960s, and bought the shuttle looms that continue to work today.)

In the decades that followed, Italian high fashion boomed and, with it, Como. By the 1980s, Taroni fabric supplied the designer evening wear of presidents and celebrities. The Duchess of York’s 1986 wedding gown was made of ivory duchess satin from Taroni; several dresses designed for Princess Diana by Catherine Walker were also made from the company’s silk. While some Como companies began outsourcing more of their production to Asia, the then Taroni head Giampaolo Porlezza declared: “There will always be wealthy people and they will always buy from me.

”In 1999, Maximilian’s father, Michele, took over Taroni. He too was a descendant of Como silk-makers, working in a family business that made silk for neckwear and women’s accessories. (Michele’s mother, Maximilian’s grandmother, picked mulberry leaves until the Second World War led to rapid industrialisation of the region and the almost wholesale import of raw yarn from China.) Michele moved the Taroni factory to a larger piece of land and modernised the system—without losing the old looms. The firm’s warehouses now hold more than 20,000 bolts of fabric in some 5,000 colours.

Despite all this success, the corporatisation of fashion since the 1980s has damaged the relationship between the maker and the designer in ways that may be irreversible. For half a century, the name of the designer and the manufacturer had run alongside in adverts—as in the Vogue of 1967—to the advantage of both. The textile maker got publicity and the designer got to show that they used high-quality fabric. But slowly, Taroni’s name began disappearing from the designers’ advertisements.

“Fashion brands became so powerful and big that it was not in their interest to be associated with the weaving mills anymore,” Canepa said. “You want to be in complete control of the product. And so, associating yourself with weaving mills is [seen as] devaluing your own brand instead of adding to it.”

With the entrance of big finance into fashion at the turn of the millennium, new clauses entered contracts, barring manufacturers from revealing their clients. “We’ve been greatly penalised for this since it makes it impossible to make our products known outside trade fairs,” said Canepa. The connect between luxury house and textile-maker is weakening in other ways. Where once Taroni spoke directly to the designer of a new collection, it is now more likely to talk to style offices that, in turn, communicate with the fashion director of the house.

Distancing the weaver from the designer, the maker from the brand, has ramifications beyond high fashion. It’s part of the same trend that produces a three-dollar T-shirt, said Canepa, made with such cheap labour that “it’s basically modern slavery”.

IF TARONI IS built on a history of craftsmanship, it also looks to the future in one vital aspect: sustainability. The firm ensured that all its processes met sustainability standards well before the market began asking for such certification. That transformation took a long time, Canepa said, because they had to ensure that not only their own factory but all the contractors who worked with them—dyers, finishers and others—also had sustainable practices. But, as he said, “it’s a matter of survival because if you don’t change, then someone else will and they’ll take your job away”.

It helps that silk is recyclable, unlike most of the polyester that floods the market. Indeed, the real challenge for Taroni is in changing the way consumers see its products in a world increasingly dominated by polyester. “I often [find] that people cannot see the difference between polyester and silk even though it’s two completely different worlds,” Canepa said. “And it’s such a shame because you know, silk is a natural fibre. Silk has been in human history for thousands of years and it’s touched so many different cultures. It’s decomposable and just so much more beautiful and better for your skin and your health than plastic.”