PUFFER JACKETS AND PRIMAVERA
Spring in Italy is one thing: moody. Picture it: it’s May, and you're in Rome.You wake up to rain tapping on your shutters. By lunch, you’re sunburnt. Afternoon coffee is accompanied by a little hail tapping you on the forehead. Before you can process it, you’re kissed by the soft sun of dusk with an aperitivo in hand. That’s primavera (Spring) in Italy.
As one can imagine, dressing for Spring weather in Italy isn’t easy, especially for visitors. The reason goes beyond battling the temperature swings and precipitation tantrums.
It comes down to seeing locals in scarves and puffer jackets (piumini), even when it’s a cool 82F outside. Why? Well, we can blame it on the cambio di stagione.
Massican's Roman correspondent, Victoria Cece, digs into why.
Il Cambio di Stagione (The Change of Seasons)
The telltale sign of Spring (Primavera) in Italy is shorts. The shorts tell you who the tourists and teenagers are.
For the most part, the locals are covered. The neck, the arms, the legs, and don’t forget the toes! Sandals are for the summer. And the locals will let you know that if you’re not following the seasonal dress code, you will feel some stares.
Because Italians generally dress for the season, not for the weather.
The cambio di stagione is like Spring cleaning for Italians but specifically for their wardrobe. It’s when one season’s clothes are sent out to storage, and the next season’s garments fill closets anew. It’s a big commitment and you will need to be pretty sure those rainy, crazy cold days of Spring are gone.
For many Italians, the safest bet is waiting for the summer solstice.
This seasonality of dressing is significant, just like the seasonality of food. It’s not only a custom but a deeply ingrained value.
Yet, the practice of cambio di stagione identifies one clear cultural difference between Italy and America: the size of things.
In Italy, most stuff is typically smaller. The roads are smaller, the ovens are smaller, and the sodas are smaller. The closets and apartments? Also not as large, meaning Italians often have less space to store things at home, like the bulky winter/Spring wardrobes.
For the Italians, it’s better to be overdressed than underdressed. It’s quite practical. You are better safe (in a scarf) than sorry.
The Mighty Sciarpa (Scarf)
When you think of Italians and scarves, I am sure you are picturing a dandy fellow sipping an espresso with a perfectly pressed scarf tied ever so elegantly across his chest, dark tousled hair combed with precision.
Allow me to interrupt your drooling for a funny little cultural discourse.
Going outside with your neck exposed in the Spring in Italy? You might as well walk outside fully naked.
Call it an ‘old wives’ tale,’but many Italians – particularly the nonnas – truly believe in the protective power of a scarf. If there’s any cold air and your neck is exposed, you are getting sick, and it is your fault.
There’s a common joke in Italy that you know you’ve assimilated into the culture (and are also getting older) when you always wear a scarf out until it’s officially too hot.
The whole ‘keeping your neck and chest covered’ has a history, of course. The ancient Romans loved scarves; a practice adopted from the ancient Egyptians. It was called a sudarium in Latin, which means a ‘sweat cloth’ – a much better name for a scarf during these bizarrely hot spring days. Then, there’s the Catholic Church and its requirements to be appropriately dressed inside (your shoulders must be covered and ideally also your legs. No shorts, even in August).
So, why the scarf in the modern era? Well, it comes back to the nonnas battling modernity and cool air even in the summer.
Enter: The Air-Conditioner
A classic cultural barrier between Italy and America is the air-conditioning unit. While AC isn’t as common in Italy, it is growing in popularity, with temperatures increasingly intolerable in the summer.
Cold air blowing without a scarf is a no-no for Nonna. And only sparks more need to cling to those layers.
Alas, there’s always a ‘but.…’
Of course, Italians aren’t all the same, and their weather isn’t either. Young Italians aren’t trying to sweat hanging with friends or working, especially if they have a shift outside, midday in Rome’s sharp Spring sun.
And not every city or region in Italy boasts an idyllic Mediterranean climate. The North is more puffer jacket weather – cool and continental. The South – in a place like Sicily – has a warm Mediterranean climate with a desert edge, powered by tumultuous hot winds coming from North Africa. We can safely say a zietta (auntie) in Sicily doesn’t own too many puffer jackets. Her cambia di stagione is much milder than a grandma in Florence, a fashion capital with a cooler Mediterranean climate and a serious love of scarves.
Regardless of where you find yourself in the mighty Italian peninsula, if you want to do as the Romans do, you better check your calendars. If the summer solstice is still weeks away, skip the sandals and stuff your suitcase with scarves. And pack that puffer, too.
Image of Massimo Troisi, writer and actor, Il Postino, 1994. (Alamay Stock)