A website entirely dedicated to Massachusetts. The queen of the States, Olga Mazzoni, pays homage with a site curated by her, rich in stories and curiosities, to her Massachusetts, represented in Italy for many years.
It is written “www.vistimass.it” and read as “Massachusetts distinctly different“. It is the new idea, translated into a website, by the fiery Olga Mazzoni, former President of Visit USA Italy and co-founder of Thema Nuovi Mondi, a Milan-based company representing various destinations in Italy.
We met Olga Mazzoni, widely nicknamed “purple woman” due to her passion for the color purple, for an interview with FullTravel.
Summary
1) Olga Mazzoni, a life dedicated to the United States and especially to Massachusetts. Why did you create this site?
I always felt a distinct and deep feeling for Massachusetts. I started an important work relationship with this state back in 1992 to promote Boston as the gateway to the entire New England region. At that time, only one US tourism promotion entity existed in Italy, the Virgin Islands (another of my longstanding clients). Besides this unique island territory, which is not a state but a territory, continental America was silent.
Therefore, the Massachusetts Port Authority, managed by Boston Airport and Port, coordinated a global network of offices dedicated both to commerce and tourism promotion towards New England.
It was a very engaging, educational, and stimulating experience that helped many Italian companies in the tourism sector – Tour Operators, Travel Agencies, Airlines, and Cruise Lines – to seriously consider a region on the Atlantic coast, made up of six states, including Massachusetts, which leads thanks to Boston, in a strategic geographical position, easily accessible from Europe.
I have vivid memories of those dynamic, pioneering 1990s, full of momentum and growth. I personally began to love the entire region and invested time and resources to spend much of my personal vacation exploring it, drawing discovery routes, meeting curious, intelligent people eager to welcome new generations of international tourists. It was an immediate fascination: so much history, traditions, arts and culture, a tangible connection with waves of Italian immigrants from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, a style so intrinsically different from the America I already knew, that of New York, Miami, Las Vegas.
The relationships built during those years were also valuable for my professional growth. I owe much to my mentor at the time, Salvador Starling, with whom we “traveled” in harmony on this challenge aimed at gradually building a solid partnership with the Italian tourism market. These were very stimulating years. I conceived the first roadshows with training diplomas (The Massachusetts Port Authority College I designed over three years), annual events (Thanksgiving Dinner celebrations), frequent product presentations where I taught much about geography, history, promoting little-known places like Plymouth, Salem, the Berkshires, Cape Cod, now unmissable landmarks. Massachusetts was my inspiring force.
In 1996, thanks to a visionary project in communication and constructive journalism with Massimo Pacifico and Silvestro Serra dedicated to Jack Kerouac’s hometown, Lowell National Historical Park of the Industrial Revolution – approached with highly avant-garde methods for the time, considered transgressive and bold – I was awarded honorary citizenship by the then-mayor of Lowell. I still keep the keys!
These are just some of the milestones that led me to love and increasingly respect the state of Massachusetts over about 30 years of professional activity. I also experienced its tumultuous and painful path with the events of September 11 and later the Boston Marathon bombing. Therefore, having accumulated so many professional and human experiences, and having traveled there over a hundred times, has undoubtedly made me an important expert on Massachusetts in Italy. All this heritage, in my view, could not be archived or kept secret.
With the 2020 pandemic and the shutdown of promotional activities by the tourism entity worldwide, I felt the need to share content and information that could inspire others to approach tourism in a way that celebrates a unique state offering universal values. Anyone experiencing a trip to Massachusetts returns not only enriched but also comforted, “illuminated” in spirit and with an open mind.
2) How important is digital promotion for the destination?
I could have written a book about Massachusetts. I chose a website in a light format, easy to browse and read. It must be accessible to everyone, and I can keep adding content.
3) If you had to give an x-ray of the Italian traveler choosing Massachusetts, what would be the most representative points?
The Italian traveler choosing Massachusetts is represented by a target of couples, families, and young people motivated by curiosity, supported by a desire to visit historical places like Plymouth, intimate landscapes like Cape Cod or Cape Ann, excellent cuisine, the charm of small coastal and rural communities like Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard, cultural excellence like in the Berkshires, inspiration for education and learning emanating from numerous colleges and universities starting with Harvard and MIT, driven by the technological and scientific research that originated here and is still cultivated, civic sense and conservation spirit, liberal mindset starting from Boston.
It is the profile of an Italian who wants to go beyond typical postcards, who also feels the call of iconic images that reflect their feelings: lighthouses, red farm barns, lobster traps piled in small ports, rocking chairs on the verandas of old inns, bucolic roads leading to ancient small worlds, fascinating college campuses. I am sketching the traveler who can grasp evocations of an America not necessarily sensationalized by tabloids, perhaps inspired by art house films, historical novels, or subdued soundscapes.
4) How do you see the near future of travel in Massachusetts?
In such a small, strict state committed to safeguarding its inhabitants, crops, seafood, farms, and the food it produces and enjoys, I see the renaissance of slow cycling trips, in pastoral and scenic contexts of great relief, discovering small villages and towns with 400 years of history behind them. I also see travel to a country that, while constantly projecting towards the future and innovation, always keeps an eye on preserving what is ancient and deserves respect and valorizations. I see gastronomic journeys, exploring the many Slow Food presidia in Massachusetts, tasting healthy and certified locally grown products. I see cultural, art, and music travels, discovering collections and artistic enclaves of great tradition, and artisan workshops.
I see romantic trips for all ages, staying in charming accommodations, historic mansions, or newly recreated inns styled and contextualized to the environment, in human-scale structures that respect the environment. I envision sensible tourism that aims at the core of the experience and is driven by the desire for multiculturalism, where there are no racial, religious, or gender disparities. I see a generation of trips driven by intense renewal movements and genuineness of feelings. In short: nothing artificial, nothing standardized or sophisticated. I continue to see travel in an America close to Europe.
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