The Wrist of Venice: Giulio Morellato and the Art of the Watchstrap, 1930

Following the First World War, the wristwatch ceased to be an exotic novelty and became an indispensable tool for active modern life. Yet the watchmaking industry—predominantly concentrated in Switzerland—treated the bracelet as an afterthought, relying on rigid metal chains or unyielding crude pigskin bands. Giulio Morellato applied centuries of Venetian leather-tanning, cordwaining, and gilding heritage to the craft. Sourcing fine calfskins, supple morocco leathers, and exotic reptiles, he pared leather edges by hand (*scarnitura*), applied vegetable dyes, and hand-stitched reinforcements with beeswaxed linen thread.

His straps were celebrated by elite jewelers in Venice and Milan for their glove-like flexibility, breathability, and seamless integration with precious gold and steel watch cases. By the late 1930s, Morellato’s workshop supplied the finest Swiss horological houses with bespoke leather straps.

In the postwar decades, under the guidance of the Carraro family who acquired the enterprise and preserved its artisanal ethos, Morellato expanded into high-end stainless steel jewelry, creating the “jewelry for living” (*gioielli da vivere*) concept that democratized luxury design.

Today, while logistics and advanced manufacturing center in the nearby Venetian mainland around Santa Maria di Sala, Morellato remains profoundly attached to its birthplace. The memory of Giulio Morellato’s 1930 atelier beneath the bells of the St. Mark’s Clocktower endures as a luminous testament to Venetian craftsmanship—where even the smallest strip of leather can be sculpted into an immortal work of art.