Colomela Festival

As per tradition, the typical FESTA DELLA COLOMELA (Colomela Festival) usually takes place on the first Sunday of August to re-enact an ancient craft, that of the construction of “Colomele” and “Scandole”:

• the Colomele are larch wood poles that were used as a support for the vines, now replaced by concrete poles. They were about 3 meters long and could last up to 30 years. Coredo was one of the great producers of colomèle and marketed it mainly in Mezzolombardo and Mezzocorona.
• the scandole (shingles), on the other hand, are larch wood tiles, now replaced with other types of roofing; they had such great importance in the past that they were considered by the Statutes of Trent which set the number for each bundle and specified their dimensions

During the event, numerous teams of amateur and professional lumberjacks compete to decide who produces the best colomele and shingles and in the shortest time. By reusing the “colomele” and “scandole” resulting from the “Festa della Colomela”, one of the artists involved in the Symposium deals with the creation of a “land art” work. fun and culinary tastings.

“The colomèle are an example of interchange between forest and agricultural crops: the larch duly cut and transformed into colomèle is brought to the agricultural land, in support of one of the main agricultural products which is the vine. So the roofs were built of wood, protected by shingles.”

“Life therefore depended, and still depends today, even if not so evidently, on the integration of forest and agricultural products; an integration that deeply binds people’s souls to their environment and what it offers, in full respect of nature and the territory”