For the Italian tanning industry, guidance and training represent essential tools for communicating and sharing the many employment and professional growth opportunities that the sector offers.
Our Training Department promotes interaction and dialogue between schools and the production world. Its goal is to support youth employment and ensure the availability of qualified resources for tanning companies through promotional initiatives, stylistic training programs, and technical education pathways.
Promotional Activities
Our Training Department promotes initiatives aimed at enhancing the Italian culture of tanning and leather, introducing young people to the production world and the employment opportunities the sector offers, while strengthening and enriching the strategic connection between tanneries and the fashion industry.
- Amici per la pelle
Since 2012, UNIC has promoted the national contest “Amici per la Pelle” to introduce younger generations to the world of leather, starting from primary school. It is an educational project that each year involves more than 1,000 students from all Italian tanning districts, bringing them closer to the world of work and helping them make informed choices about their future education. The contest is open to second- and third-year middle school students from the four main tanning districts (Tuscany, Veneto, Campania, and Lombardy). Each year, students create objects related to a specific theme, ensuring they are made entirely of leather. Once completed, the works are exhibited at a dedicated stand during the winter edition of Lineapelle. - Le belle Lettere della Pelle
The project serves as an introduction to the “Amici per la Pelle” contest and aims to engage children with the world of leather starting from primary school. The initiative is carried out in collaboration with educational institutions and local administrations in several municipalities within the tanning districts of Tuscany and Campania.
- Tanning Orienteering
Tanning Orienteering is a school and vocational guidance project promoted by UNIC – Italian Tanneries, with the support of the Associazione Conciatori and the Consorzio Conciatori di Ponte a Egola. Its goal is to raise awareness among lower secondary school teachers about the professional opportunities offered by the leather supply chain. At the same time, the project aims to inform teachers in first-grade secondary schools about the different educational and career paths available in the leather industry. For this reason, teachers are involved in a comprehensive program of exchange and collaboration with entrepreneurs, representatives of the leather supply chain, economists, universities, research institutions, and national authorities.
- Stylistic Training
Dedicated to young designers and students from the most prestigious fashion schools and institutes, the stylistic training projects curated by our Training Department engage numerous institutions through a wide range of initiatives.
- LP Fashion Studio
The Department organizes lessons and visits at the innovative LP Fashion Studio showroom for academies, fashion schools, vocational training institutes, and delegations (both national and international) dedicated to the many creative expressions of leather fashion developed over the past 30 years. The space offers an international overview of past and future trends and represents a living, one-of-a-kind resource for designers and researchers in the leather sector. The project was conceived as a continuously evolving platform, updated and transformed in step with seasonal trends while maintaining a solid “historical” and archival foundation. Its goal is to foster a constant exchange between designers’ creativity and their experimentation.
Course details (click to open)
- Internships
UNIC periodically hosts students from various institutes for internship programs.
Technical and Product Training
The courses are aimed at all professionals working in the various sectors that use leather (footwear, leather goods, automotive and furniture interiors, apparel, etc.), with the goal of deepening knowledge of the material and providing greater awareness in selecting and using different types of finished leather. Some topics are specifically designed for sales personnel dealing with leather products. Courses can be organized as inter-company sessions or upon request by individual companies. Content, duration, and delivery methods can be customized to meet specific needs.
Cultural and Patronage Activities
The catalogue of UNIC – Italian Tanneries’ relationship with art and culture is rich and diverse, consisting of both ongoing activities and unique projects.
It begins with the 1994 publication of La Conceria Italiana dal Medioevo ad Oggi (“The Italian Tanning Industry from the Middle Ages to Today”): 3,000 copies, including 300 bound in leather, distributed to scholars, universities, and libraries. This ambitious and important work, written by historians of economic and social history, aimed to fill a historiographical gap regarding the social and industrial significance of tanning in Italy. The book is based on the idea that tanning is a civilizing craft, tracing its evolution from the 11th century to the early 1900s across Piedmont, Lombardy, Veneto, Sardinia, Tuscany, the Marche, and southern Italy—documenting and celebrating a tradition that must be preserved and transmitted.
In 2001, UNIC published La pelle e le sue magie nel regno delle fiabe (“Leather and Its Magic in the Realm of Fairy Tales”), a collection of classic stories featuring leather, illustrated by renowned artist Ferenc Pintér and gifted to elementary schools in tanning districts.
In 2010, UNIC collaborated with the Italian Association for Terminology, the Accademia della Crusca, and the CNR to clarify linguistic inaccuracies found in dictionaries and online sources (such as Wikipedia) regarding terms used in the tanning industry.
In 2011, UNIC contributed to the restoration of the Doge’s Palace in Venice and launched the art and creativity contest Amici per la Pelle for middle school students in tanning districts—a project that has since become a curricular educational activity.
In 2014, UNIC collaborated with the Jas Art Ballet company, led by La Scala étoiles Sabrina Brazzo and Andrea Volpintesta, on the dance performance Il Mantello di Pelle di Drago (“The Dragon Leather Cloak”) and the creation of its leather stage costumes. The show toured in Italy and internationally, including performances at New York’s Lincoln Center and London’s Palladium Theatre.
In 2016, UNIC supported Le parole di un’arte (“The Words of a Craft”), a study by Professor Maria Teresa Zanola of the Catholic University of Milan, exploring the linguistic and cultural heritage of tanning, inspired by documents from 1650 by Leopoldo de’ Medici, and accompanied by a performance featuring actor Giancarlo Giannini.
In 2018, UNIC participated in Rivelazioni – Finance for Fine Arts, an initiative by Borsa Italiana, supporting the restoration of Nicolas Régnier’s painting Judith.
In 2019, under the Art Bonus scheme, UNIC funded the restoration of the Orthopascha, a 16th-century manuscript made of parchment sheets and leather binding, housed at Venice’s Biblioteca Marciana. The restoration—addressing damage from time and insects—preserved a Latin dissertation on calendar reform written in 1508 by the humanist Pellegrino Prisciani.
In 2023, UNIC supported the exhibition and museum project Le Vie dell’Acqua a Mediolanum, coordinated by the Civic Archaeological Museum of Milan, which included a section on the discovery of a Roman tannery beneath Piazza Meda near La Scala Theatre, contemporary to that of Pompeii.
Also in 2023, UNIC promoted Il Laboratorio del Sogno (“The Dream Workshop”), an edutainment initiative part of the Festival dei Due Mondi in Spoleto, continuing its mission—both in Italy and abroad—to promote the ancient art of leather glove-making.
The purpose of these initiatives is clear: not only to promote the tanning sector and its primary material—leather—but also to broaden the positive impact of the Italian tanning industry beyond its own field. Among these projects, two stand out as unique examples of UNIC’s cultural commitment.
The first is featured in a volume published in 2025, available online in Italian (https://cultura.unic.it/books/la-conceria-di-pompei/) and English (https://cultura.unic.it/books/the-tannery-of-pompei/). This project, which earned UNIC the Corporate Art Award in 2018, traces its origins back to 79 AD, when Mount Vesuvius erupted and buried Pompeii and Herculaneum. In 1873, excavations near Porta Stabia revealed a tannery, later fully uncovered in 1950—an extraordinary site comprising a residence with an attached tanning area: a portico divided into six sections, 15 circular vats used for vegetable and alum tanning, and the famous Memento Mori mosaic, now housed in the Naples Archaeological Museum.
In 2008, UNIC and Lineapelle signed an agreement with the Naples and Pompeii Superintendency for the tannery’s restoration, investing around €250,000. In 2018, the project entered its second phase to make the site accessible to visitors, transforming it into an open-air museum that celebrates the historical, cultural, and educational value of tanning. The restored Pompeii tannery reopened to the public in June 2023.
The second project is editorial and dates back to 1893. Over more than a century—except during the two World Wars—La Conceria has evolved from a trade publication for the tanning industry into a key communication platform for the entire leather supply chain, from suppliers to manufacturers and brands. From its inception, La Conceria (https://www.laconceria.it/) has stood apart from typical trade journals. It was founded not only to share market prices but to inform, debate, and shape opinion—to create culture. Every article is characterized by journalistic precision, which remains its defining hallmark today. While maintaining its historic print edition (now monthly and subscription-based), La Conceria has successfully expanded its digital presence, reaching nearly 5 million page views and 18.5 million interactions in 2024, engaging over 1.8 million unique users.
Published by Lineapelle, La Conceria exemplifies how an industrial sector with strong artisanal roots can, for over 130 years, provide in-depth, far-reaching coverage of topics ranging from industry news to macroeconomic trends—spreading knowledge, preserving craftsmanship, and promoting the excellence of Italian manufacturing.
For UNIC, creating culture is not only a responsibility—it is a resource that generates engagement, connection, and value. It is a tool for development, because, as Kaleidos, the social impact lab of Banca Ifis, states, “art and culture are tools that can produce innovation in a new, more human and less formal way.” Dedicated to fostering high-impact social initiatives, Kaleidos launched the corporate cultural platform Economia della Bellezza in 2020, based on the idea that “art and culture are strategic assets of competitiveness.” In 2024, Kaleidos included UNIC – Italian Tanneries and Lineapelle among its case studies, alongside Sanlorenzo Yachts, Ferragamo, Pirelli Hangar Bicocca, CCIAA-MILOMB with Triennale Milano, and Kartell. This recognition confirms the Italian tanning industry’s commitment to investing in art and culture not only to strengthen its reputation and authority but also to generate shared value. As Banca Ifis explains, “Companies that invest in these areas are not only more competitive—they bring beauty into the workplace, benefiting employees and stakeholders alike, with positive effects on community well-being and business performance.” Beauty—always with a capital “B”—may not save the world, but it can certainly make it a better place.
