Made in Italy

Diego Della Valle, the charismatic chief of Tod’s, knows a thing or two about la dolce vita—enough, in fact, to fill a weighty coffee-table book. Italian Touch, to be published in September by Skira in collaboration with the Italian leather goods giant, features more than 100 photographs of the people and places that make Della Valle’s homeland the object of American fantasies, from a film set–worthy Tuscan castle to a handsome Milanese financier who rides his horse impeccably dressed in a white polo shirt and tight jodhpurs. The book, edited by Donatella Sartorio and photographed by Paolo Leone, will be available at bookstores for $95.

Gallerist Orio Vergani in Milan.

“What they all have in common is that they live a life full of beautiful principles,” Della Valle says of the subjects, which include the artistically prominent Gastel clan, shot at Castello de’ Giorgi, their family estate; eccentric art gallerist Orio Vergani; and Costanza della Gherardesca, Anna Caracciolo and Maddalena Serristori, cousins who live across Europe but share an ancestral villa in Maremma. “Some are famous, but all are down-to-earth,” Della Valle says. “They know who they are.”