The whole architecture and town planning (except the first spinning department, created by engineer Angelo Colla), was submitted to the architect Ernesto Pirovano. For about fifty years Pirovano, helped by the engineer Pietro Brunati, ran the construction of the village.

The factory was built along the main road, in the western area of the town, facing the river Adda. The owner’s Villa was created near to the factory. It was built in medieval style and nowadays it rises above the village thanks to its high tower.

The priest’s house and the doctor’s house, set in the northern part of the inhabited area, separated from the other houses, because they were built in an upper area, in order to underline their moral and spiritual status above any other interests.

The church, the school building, the theatre and all the other social services offered by Crespi family, lie in the central part of the village, around which there are long streets with well lined-up workers’ houses.

The houses are separated thanks to lawns and kitchen gardens and are along regular and parallel roads, according to the ideals of order and respect that Crespi wanted to communicate to the workers.

The walls of all the workers’ houses were hung with red brick decoration in order to standardize them. The priest and the doctor’s houses had red brick cornices around windows, frets below the roof and a red brick stringcourse along the facade. Originally, workers’ houses’ windows and doors were hung with red tiles decorations and their facades had the typical stringcourses, which have been removed after Crespi’s departure.

The sheds of the factory are hung with red brick decorations and particular friezes similar to eight tip stars, the windows are decorated with red-brick rose windows. The administration buildings are hung with further ornamental elements and also the managers and department heads’ houses have several decorative elements realized using different materials. These villas were built in the southern area and were set in a more reserved part of the village.

In the south of the suburb, at the end of the main road, the cemetery rises maybe to symbolize the last inhabitants’ stage. It was projected in 1896 from Gaetano Moretti: he also planned the electric power station Taccani in Trezzo d’Adda, which is a marvel of early 20th-century art nouveau.
The cemetery is different from the town planning architecture: its impressive mausoleum conveys awe and sadness. Somehow it underlines the power of the empire and the humility of the subjects who are lying to the feet of it. Also the humble headstones set in the lawn in front of the mausoleum seem to underline their subordinate position. However, it bears no relation to reality: Silvio Crespi’s respect for the family and the mankind endeared him to the village.

Silvio Crespi decided to build semi-detached houses for employees. They are about fifty. Each family enjoyed four rooms, which created a small house. The three-entrance houses were provided with a grand staircase that brought to eight rooms. According to the number of the family members, two or three families were accommodated in an house.

The rooms were very high: around 3,50 meters. They had large windows so that sun and air could enter in the house: in Silvio Crespi’s thought, sun and air were absolutely necessary to workers’ health.
The hygienic services were built outside the building and they were provided with a latrine and a sink. A lodge near the house was used as woodshed or as hen-pen.
Each house was delimited by special fences, created using wood and cotton bales binding strips. Around the houses there were lawns and kitchen gardens, which have been cultivated by the inhabitants nowadays. When Crespi family owned the village, the workers were used to enter a particular competition: the cleanest garden was awarded by an examining board. It was an intelligent competition that suggested to the workers how to spend their leisure time. The inhabitants cleaned their own houses and at the same time they made attractive the whole village.

The houses were assigned to the employees and they could live there over their work life inside the factory. They were bounded to leave the house free after the breaking-off of the work relationship; this has never happened, because the families had always a member working in the factory.
A particular accommodation rule was in force in Crespi d’Adda: only relative or friend families could live in the same building, so each member of the family was well-respected by the others. The people employed in factory had the same working hours, in order to avoid uneasiness.
The rent (which was inclusive of light, water and gas) was really fair: it was about 1/3 of what tenants used to pay in other towns. It was settled through an allowance from the fortnightly pay-packet.
A discount was granted to the hard workers or to the poor families.

The relationship between the employer and the employees was positive, although more than fifty years have run since Crespi family’s departure. The village has been changed and new generations were born, but they still have tender feelings for Crespi family.
During the summer holidays Crespi ladies used to visit the sick and they often paid for poor families’ kept.
The construction of the settlement took lots of years and was accomplished in the Thirties. In 1928 the fiftieth factory creation anniversary was celebrated the village was almost finished.

Il cimitero si distacca dal complesso architettonico del paese, creando, con l’imponente mausoleo, un senso di soggezione e di mestizia. Sembra voler rimarcare la potenza dell’impero e l’umiltà e le povertà dei sudditi che giacciono ai piedi dei “grandi” in atto di servitù, simboleggiate dalle umili lapidi poste nel prato antistante il mausoleo. Ciò che traspare, però, non rende onore a Silvio Crespi, che, grazie al culto che nutriva per l’uomo e la famiglia, con i suoi operai e dipendenti si è comportato in maniera decisamente diversa.

• The five department head’s houses were built between 1925 and 1930 in a more isolated area. They are different from the workers’ houses because of their architectural style, their structure and their decorative elements.
According to the number of the family members, two or three families were accommodated in an house.

• Each of the eight managers’ villas is completely different from the others. They were built in a very isolated area. Their Anglo-Saxon style is due to the different building materials: grit , stone, "ceppo dell’Adda", etc.
One of them is the general manager’s villa, which is unparalleled thanks to a wooden balcony-parvis which link the house and an annex.
All the villas are surrounded by small parks.
They were built between 1925 and 1930.

Owner’s villa was built in 13th-century medieval style and has a 700m2 area. It has two towers: one is spire shaped and fifty meters high (through its "belvedere" you can enjoy the beautiful panorama of the river Adda, from the Prealps near Lecco and Bergamo to the lowland in Lombardy) and the other, not so high, has a terrace and a water reservoir.
The ground floor is externally decorated by "ceppo dell’Adda" and red tiles in the upper part. The cornices around the windows and the balconies are made in bricks and in carved and enamelled terracotta. A particular contrast is created by stones of Saltrio, Mapello and Verona for the capitals, the windowsills, the shoulders and the grand staircases, and by several colours and kinds of marble for the eighty columns in the mullioned windows and the arcaded loggias.
It was hung with same pattern panels. The polychromy was also created thanks to frescos, Venice mosaics and high-relieves in marble of Carrara. Doors and windows were decorated with gilded frames, bronzes and carved wrought iron.
The rooms were about forty. The balconies, which were built around a 100m2 atrium, had carvings and a ornamented glass skylight.
The villa was surrounded from a beautiful park.

The architect Ernesto Pirovano planned both the project and the decoration process, the engineer Pietro Brunati planned the architectural project.

The story of the village affected the story of the villa, we can remind:
• from 1892 (when it was built) to the Thirties the villa was used by Crespi family, especially during the summer holidays;
• from 1936-37, when the whole village were controlled by the S.T.I. (Stabilimenti Tessili Italiani), the villa was used as GIL-centre (Gioventù Italiana del Littorio), where young people were prepared to become Fascist Party’s members;
• during the war (1941-45) it became a military command centre and the surrounding park was used as parking area for military cars;
• in the Sixties it provisionally became Capriate San Gervasio Junior High School;
• in the early Seventies, after that "Rossari and Varzi" had been sold, the villa was purchased by a man, still owner of the villa.

During the years, the inner spaces have been changed and the furniture has been lost.

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