Lucia Boscaini and the Bulgari Heritage

A collection of items and archived documents put together over the years, The shift from 'muscular' exhibitions to visual stories. A journey through identity explained by Lucia Boscaini, Bulgari’s Brand Heritage Director


  • Lucia Boscaini, Bulgari’s Brand Heritage Director.

    Lucia Boscaini, Bulgari’s Brand Heritage Director.

  •  Onyx and diamond Synthetiser necklace, Wild Pop collection, Bulgari High Jewelry.

    Onyx and diamond Synthetiser necklace, Wild Pop collection, Bulgari High Jewelry.

800 items, mainly jewelry, in the Bulgari archives in Rome, plus about 100,000 sketches – the oldest dating back to 1910. Eleven million euros spent at auction to purchase the necklace with pendant that belonged to Elizabeth Taylor – to be more precise, 6 million for the pendant and 5 for the necklace – to testify just how much of an enormously valuable asset the Roman company’s creative patrimony actually is today. «Nowadays the concept of Heritage is really felt, it represents our identity» says Lucia Boscaini. «But it is an activity that belongs to our more recent history, it is a cultural question. The Bulgari family has always looked towards the future, it has an inclination for research, for action, for new ideas. Nevertheless, it is only since the mid-1990s that it began to understand how interesting it would be for the company to take a closer look at its patrimony. It all came about by chance, from the desire to compile a book on the brand’s history. But the real turning point was the retrospective organized to celebrate the company’s 125th anniversary in 2009 and, above all, the response of the public, which urged us to take the importance of enriching our archives into greater consideration. This also coincided with Bulgari becoming part of the French group LVMH (2011), whose vision of the future had a considerable effect on our vision. We began to address the management of our patrimony with a strategic view. We built it up and intensified research so that the Heritage would become the brand’s primary expression. Nowadays Bulgari expresses itself by baring its soul through a specific narrative angle, which is the most authentic, the very heart of the brand, with, however, one thought always on business. So much so that a Heritage Office was added to marketing and communication. For us, the only way to be directly involved in exhibitions, publications, product launches, is to offer a real value-driven and content-formulated contribution.» Lucia Boscaini, a business studies graduate, has been researching in the Roman company since 2001, assisting the Bulgari family in the purchase of historical pieces. «Over the last few year, Bulgari’s patrimony has taken on an increasingly strategic role,» she adds. «The company thought of me as the company’s Heritage guarantor able to go beyond the simple curatorship of exhibitions, owing to an experience which unites a knowledge of the brand with budget management skills. Another radical change that we have made involves the development of exhibition themes. We now develop themes that are less product-oriented, enriching them with narrative itineraries, visual accounts, that leave behind the concept of retrospective to make room for new logics. We want and we must express our Roman character, our ‘being Roman,’ a priority for Bulgari, also with the support of patronage activities in favor of Rome and always in agreement with our French Ceo, Jean-Christophe Babin.»


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