 That’s one of the most frequent questions heard at the Bolle, the futuristic structure found at the Nardini Distillery in Bassano del Grappa. It’s a fascinating place, and Nardini hosts private tours so you can see this work of art designed by Massimiliano Fuksas, the world class architect contracted by the Nardini family to commemorate their 225th anniversary of grappa making. The structure houses a conference center, laboratory, auditorium with film on the grappa making process, tasting area and store.
 I happened to be there the day the cleaning crew came and I saw them up on the top, with a harness clipped onto a steel ring right in the center of the glass bubble. From there they use their bucket and sponge, cleaning as they move across and down the sides. The crew manager is Letizia, a 33 year old woman, and I asked if I could take a ride to the top. Sure, she offered and I hopped in the little basket with her. I can tell you 30 meter is HIGH! We get to the top and I say hi to the workers. “Are any of you mountain climbers?” I ask. Nope, not one.
Most of the crew find this job fun, also because they don’t have to do it every day. “It’s pretty rough in the summer”, they remark “ we have to work at dawn, because when the sun starts beating down the water evaporates too quickly and we get poor results”.
We slowly start to navigate our way down as Letizia works the joystick. We hear a dull THUD and we jerk to a stop. “The cherry picker has been acting up today, we’ll get it working again, said Letizia calmly, and I kept repeating to myself how many backup systems there must be on this machine. Time was ticking away, though, and I was on my lunch hour to boot…
Tarsillo, the man Friday at Nardini got in the truck and started working another joystick down below and we started to slowly descend. I’m sure everyone could hear my sigh of relief from the ground below!
I sure have new respect for the cleaners’ job, and … two days later I found myself in Milan at a fair in Rho in a structure created by Fuksas, only about 100 times bigger and guess what I saw? A cleaning crew harnessed on top with buckets and sponge!
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