The First Flower Market was born in Ospedaletti

The first flower market

Behind every miracle there is always a saint. And maybe two. In fact, upstream of the prodigious socio-economic floriculture of Ospedaletti we find in the year of the lord 1850, two events of decisive importance: the arrival of the very first "Tourist" (as the "globetrotters" were called then) and the emergence of floriculture. A production activity that, favored by the priceless climate of the Riviera, had to radically change the fate of the country and its hinterland and employ eight generations of flower growers. Before then, and until the second half of the nineteenth century, the economy of Ospedaletti and the entire area was based on port activity, fishing and, above all, on the culture of citrus fruits.

The birth certificate of floriculture is signed by one of the most prestigious men in the field of genetics. Professor Mario Calvino, who indicates a precise date: May 3, 1874. And he writes: “… ..the flower trade was born in Ospedaletti, in 74, by the work of a certain Luigi Bessi who went to the market every day to also buy some of those flowers that were brought by the Ortolani. SanREmasche housewives, ladies and servants of the foreign colony, together with fruit and vegetables also bought meadow flowers and ornamental plants at the stalls when there were. “One morning, says Mario Calvino, father of the great Italian writer Calvino, while Luigi Bessi came home with a bunch of flowers taken from the market, he met a friend, a Parisian textile dealer named Julien, who used to winter between Sanremo and Nice.

That meeting was decisive, because monsieur Julien, sipping a "bitter", made Bessi observe that those meadow flowers, if they had gone to Paris that morning, at that time, would have sold by weight. "No problem, and soon done," said Bessi, in return. "Just tell me where to send them to Paris, and I'll send them to you." Thus was born the first floral company of all time, Julien & Bessi ", which began its activity with the shipment, in Paris, of two daily baskets of Bengal roses, violets from Taggia, Rose del Poggio, and Daisies , anemones and buttercups from the fields. It remains to be remembered that the first floral market on the Riviera opened in Ospedaletti in 1994, three years earlier than in Sanremo. Among the pioneers of our memorable floral craftsmanship, those who almost a century ago began the cultivation and acclimation of tropical plants and flowers, alongside the "fabulous" Ludovico Winter of Heidelberg and Alphonse Karr and Thomas Hambury, up to the last "maghidel fiore "Domenico Aicardi and Ermanno Moro, Meilland and Guilland it is right to remember Louis Isnard, a Provencal who arrived in Ospedaletti as head gardener of the Societé Francière Lyonnaise, not only did he start cultivating carnation, but he gave life to an authentic school of floriculture, certainly the first in the world. for two years, between 1893 and 1894, the Knight Isnard gave lessons to dozens of students, revealing to them the magical secrets of floral genetics and, therefore, the production of carnations for cuttings and the creation of new varieties of sowing. Among the notable guests of Ospedaletti in those years, two young women stand out, already famous or close to celebrity. Their names: Mary Goldwin and Catherine Mansfield. Sick in the chest, the great novelist of "In a German Pension and" The garden party "wrote to friends that she had found" in the balsamic climate of Ospedaletti, in a pink house with two cedars in front and the sea ", hope and interests of The other famous woman we like to remember, the Goldwin, was the "sweet companion" of Peter Shelley, the great romantic poet who, passionate sailor, would drown, young, in the summer of 1922 off the coast of Viareggio, in the shipwreck of her "Ariel". And Mary, in the "Diary of a love" published, in her time, also in Italy, says that during the short landing in the bay of Ospedaletti, "delicious country of ten houses and two churches, but that's enough stepping out of the house to sneak into the sea ..... "he had invented one of the most universal characters in fantasy literature: the disturbing" Frankestein ".