Alpe Colle, this is the name of the bookshop built at an altitude of 1238 meters by Marco Tosi, a 36-year-old bookseller from Verbania. Nestled in the Piedmontese mountains, Alpe Colle is a bookshop created inside an ancient abandoned mountain pasture that Tosi has restored and made usable again by the community.
Alpe Colle
A real point of reference for mountain lovers overlooking Lake Maggiore. For the Tosi family, Alpe Colle is a work and a family place, frequented since the beginning of the twentieth century. The house was razed to the ground in the roundup of '44 and then rebuilt in the XNUMXs. The library in the Tosi mountains is already a model that meets and compares with all the other libraries scattered throughout the boot.
The seat of Alpe Colle, an independent high-altitude bookshop unique in Italy, is white and red. From last April it will remain open every Sunday until next October. Definitely a unique reality throughout the Alps: only on Mont Blanc, in Punta Helbronner, there is another high-altitude bookshop managed by Feltrinelli, therefore not independent. The young bookseller sincerely hopes that his experience will become good practice and be borrowed from others on other Italian peaks. “We don't need table recipes but concrete examples – says Tosi – I hope mine can be so, season after season, also for others who feel the need to return to the mountains or to revive places and pastures”.
(Photo Facebook Alpe Colle Library)
