This work sees its preparatory stage a few months before, when the images that will be depicted onto the tarmac of the city centre's roads are studied and drawn on paper before being created with the «pula», the local name for sawdust.

The paper drawing is then transferred onto plywood panels which are then drilled and work as dies  to lay onto the road. And still during the months that precede the creation of the carpets tons of sawdust are selected, which are then coloured with aniline-based colorants, and kept until the moment the drawings will be carried out.

Geometric patterns, sacred depictions which often portray the mystery of the Eucharist, but also the reproduction of famous renaissance paintings and floral designs are magical and almost surreal subjects created by the carpeters' imagination.
The hardest part of the job starts in the late afternoon before the day of the Corpus Domini. Craftsmen lay the plywood dies on the ground, about 30 panels for each carpet, and under the guidance of the most expert in the group the real creation starts, allowing the sawdust to flow into the empty spaces of each die.

This work continues throughout the night until the first lights of dawn, and after a few hours, around nine o'clock, the procession of the Corpus Domini starts along its path through the carpets that have recently been finished.

May.2002

Municipality of Camaiore
APT Versilia