About us

It's not easy to talk about us, we hope to do it better with the quality of our products, the service we provide and not least, our ideas.

Where is Casa Cenina?
Casa Cenina is in the Tuscan countryside, not far from Arezzo and close to the Foreste Casentinesi National Park. You will probably find some pictures in the pages dedicated to meetings we have organized.

How was it born?
Three people with very different background and experience met and started this site in the hope to create a different way to express their creativity. Some were cross-stitching fiends, others were computer wizards; they wanted to start a community for passionate people. While the first version of the site was being built the idea of a shop came up as they realized that there were very few on-line sites dedicated to this beautiful art of embroidery or they were lacking something. Soon they realized that lots of interesting products were made outside Italy and were difficult to get here. With the right amount of arrogance and irresponsibility -necessary for every new enterprise to take place- they decided to transform the Community in a true online shop.

Who is Who at Casa Cenina?

• Cristina (crys): she is no doubt the cross stitching expert (she is so daring as to teach workshops for perfect backstitching!) Not contents of this she additionally breeds Norvegian Forests cats and plays role-playing games on line. She is no doubt the one to contact for technical tips. One only problem, you can find her at night but not during the day!
• Monica (cencia): The lover of beauty. Together with Crys she looks for novelties and choses the majority of our products. In addition of being the Lady of the House at Casacenina she handles a large part of the shipping and gives birth to promotional initiatives with Giovanni. If you write to her don't expect to receive a prompt reply - she claims mail trouble all the time!
• Giovanni (aka: ciofina): le Deus ex Machina, oops! Pardon: le Deus ex Ordinateur, de Casa Cenina. Après avoir parcouru l'Italie pendant plusieurs année pour son activité toute informatique, il a décidé de se retirer à Casa Cenina: le monde, y comprises Italie et les iles, bien sûr!, sont en tout cas devant ses yeux, dans l'écran de tous ses ordinateurs, toujours ouverts sur Internet! Il suit notre megastore en ligne et reproche tous nous (mais, en réalité, il nous aime et il le démontre dans la réalité des faits) et, entretemps, il s'occupe aussi d'autres importants magasins en ligne. C'est le moteur technique et de l'organisation de Casa Cenina. Un type généreux et disponible, même si un peu humoral (ce n'est pas sa faute! Il est Scorpion!). Et même s'il n'est pas réussi à comprendre la différence entre Aida 64 et Lin 32ct., il représente de fait e de droit le Premier Homme de Casa Cenina et la preuve vivante du fait qu'il ne s'agit pas d'un monde seulement pour les femmes!
• Elena (la Seria): She handles accounting and shipping problems for a business growing esponentially more complex every minute. If you have comments that are not compliments she is the one to address them to (nicely!). She was the only one, with Cristina, to actually embroider before Casacenina was born!
• Elena-2 (il castoro): she has been the first to open a Casa Cenina selling point, but now she's a fundamental part of our staff since she takes care of foreign customers and foreign suppliers.
• Paola (agitazione): she's entered Casa Cenina to replace Elena-1 for her maternity leave and now she's our jolly: from packs to accountability and expeditions, she follows all the orders and she dedicates her free time to soccer!
• Ilaria (ilariabu): accurately and lively takes care of our French and English-speaking friends and of the web-site translations. Like Giovanni, she didn't know many things about embroidery before entering Casa Cenina, but she's becoming a real expert, too!
• Giulio (forza Padova): he studies to become a manager, but he loves foreign languages even more (he is a polyglot), so he might become one in the "poor embroidery world". Above all, he is "the second man" at Casa Cenina and helps "Ilariabu" and "Il Castoro" for the linguistic issues.
• Maria Cristina (mary): a fundamental support for Daniela for the preparation of the packs. Mary is always patient and kind. Actually, a lot of carefulness and precision are required to find all the ordered items in our warehouse!
• Laura (Laura): she helps Daniela with the packing and Paola with the allocations (mysterious word we often hear here in our warehouse).
• Eleonora (Japan): the newcomer in Casa Cenina's warehouse, she has the task to organise the allocations (here they come again!) and to arrange our huge library.
• Karin (Karin): Not a simple supplier, but a nice friend, right from the start: this is Karin for Casa Cenina. Our Dutch "pillar" has always been a keen stitcher and in-depth expert of Norther European needlework and craft, as well as a reliable business partner and more than dynamic woman! She's an inexhaustible resource for us, as insiders of this industry, and for you too, who love what you craft! Whenever you may need, she'll be thrilled to teach you something, disclose some secrets and tricks, show you some of the ancient needlework masterpieces she's always collected :-)
• Ton (Ton: As "logistical manager" of Beardie Designs he was triggered by her enthusiasm. Coming from an IT software factory world - just like our "boss" Giovanni (strange coincidence... Or destiny?!??!!!) - he stepped into the world of stitching. After comments of missing the special products in the Dutch shops, he suggested to start with a webshop, called am-inspirations. More and more he became influenced by the stitching variety and now he can tell a lot about fabrics, threads etc.  He has been to a number of shows (mainly building and dismantling the booths) the past 4 years both in Holland, Belgium, France and Germany. He is now the third, very welcome, man to step into the world of Casa Cenina, for he feels it is time to upgrade to this family! Together with our "first man" Giovanni and our "second man" Giulio, they are the living evidence that craft is not just a "female thing" :-)
• Caterina (cirillina): She makes beautiful scubidùs (each of us at Casacenina has one of Caterina's hand made key holders) importing the necessary materials directly from the United States. She does not like the idea of selling them on the site (we hope to eventually change her mind) but if you are interested she'll be happy to answer to your questions. She is the actual owner of Casacenina however, therefore the last person to whom you want to address your criticism!

Cenina S.r.l.
Loc. Cenina, 184/A
52010 Capolona (AR)
P.IVA: 01651310516
C.C.I.A.A. 128424
Fax: 0575-033115
E-Mail: shopping@casacenina.com