Quincinetto puts the Deco brand on the purple benches of kindness

The councilor for kindness Erina Patti: “They can’t be bought, they must be built by the community”

QUINCINETTO. La Deco, Municipal Denomination of Origin, on the purple bench of kindness. Because it is right here, in this small town of just under a thousand inhabitants, that the idea was born by the deputy mayor and councilor for kindness Erina Patti, and the first was realized in December 2019. And it is right here, less than three years from that day, the need arose to secure the intangible value of the purple benches, which represents the real wealth of the initiative. In less than three years, the purple benches registered in the dedicated online public archive are 211. The tangible sign that Patti’s kind idea is liked and, at Quincinetto, has taken root almost everywhere. Just scroll online, however, to find purple benches for street furniture for sale from 500 to 900 euros. And the point is precisely this: kindness is neither bought nor sold. Erina Patti is very clear: «Everyone is free to install all the purple benches he wants, God forbid, but the purple bench of kindness is a different thing. It is not bought. It is the recovery of something in disuse that takes on a new life, paints itself together, is the result of a community initiative. I am very happy that, at Quincinetto, the idea of ​​the purple benches of kindness has spread so much and people like it. But what is important is the intangible value behind the purple bench. And this is the project that we aim to strengthen also with the Deco brand ».

The pupils of the primary school had contributed to the purple bench of Quincinetto’s kindness, to the playground. In addition to painting, councilor Patti also proposed some actions that can be implemented on the bench: get together, make peace, get together, read a book, play and play together. In June of a year ago, the national project Let’s build kindness carried out tirelessly by Luca Nardi, had dedicated a week to the construction of new purple benches throughout Italy. And now, that the initiative has given wings, there is a need to specify the characteristics of the purple bench: «It must be at zero or almost no cost, redeveloped or built by the community, children and young people must be involved. The bench must be the subject of a public inauguration and bear a phrase linked to kindness ». Patti shares with Nardi the ambitious project of the power of kindness: «Actions are contagious. We have given ourselves a time horizon within which kindness can walk on its own: it is 2036 ».