Marcato

Pasta Begins Before the Pot

Most kitchen products solve a problem. Marcato products ask a different question: what if making itself were the goal – not just the eating afterwards? This question is behind every Atlas, behind every ravioli mould, behind every pastry wheel cut. Pasta is one of the few foods that can be made by hand without special experience, expensive ingredients or technical knowledge – and that nonetheless tastes different from anything that can be bought. Not because durum wheat semolina, egg and water are special in themselves. But because freshly rolled pasta has a texture that dried industrial pasta cannot match: a slightly rough, porous surface, created by the mechanical rolling process, that binds sauce instead of letting it run off.

In 1930, Otello Marcato did not simply invent a kitchen appliance. He built a tool that enabled people to make something they could not before – or at least not as easily and not with this result. He assembled the first machine in a workshop behind his house in Campodarsego, a small town in the Province of Padua in the Veneto, a region where fresh pasta is as much a part of daily culture as breakfast. He sold them by bicycle – to neighbours, relatives, acquaintances from the village. No wholesale channels, no distribution network, no marketing budget. Just a machine that worked and the immediate curiosity of the people around him. This simplicity of the beginning remains part of Marcato's identity to this day: tools that fulfil their purpose without detours.

1938, 1962, 1965 – Three Dates That Point in One Direction

1938: demand exceeds what a workshop behind a house can handle. Otello Marcato opens the first factory in Campodarsego, equipped to produce pasta machines faster and in larger quantities. This factory still stands today – extended, modernised, but at the same location, in the same community. It remains the only production site of Marcato worldwide. Everything the company sells is made there. This is not coincidence or a nostalgic anchor – it is a deliberate decision the company has made repeatedly despite global growth.

1962: the first international order arrives. Pasta machines are shipped to Philadelphia in the United States. It is the beginning of a global expansion that today takes Marcato to over 90 countries – always supplied from the same location. The factory in Campodarsego produces up to 2,500 pasta machines per day and around 250,000 rollers per month. 70 per cent of turnover is generated through exports. For a company of this size to produce 100 per cent at a single location is exceptional in the global kitchen appliance market.

1965: the Atlas is introduced. A pasta machine in chrome-plated cast steel, robust, precise, with adjustable roller thickness and interchangeable cutting attachments. In the following decades it becomes the world's best-selling manual pasta machine. Cooking schools on five continents use it. Professionals and home cooks alike. Its design language – clear, functional, unmistakably Italian – has not fundamentally changed since 1965. The technology was refined, the attachments became more numerous, the variants broader. But the core idea and the core principle are the same. There was no reason to change them, because they work.

What 'Made in Italy' Means at Marcato Specifically

'Made in Italy' is a term used inflationally in the kitchen world and often means little more than: the final product was assembled in Italy, even if the parts came from Asia. At Marcato it can be stated more precisely: all components of all products – from the main roller to the smallest screw – are manufactured and assembled in the factory in Campodarsego. No outsourcing, no partial manufacturing in low-cost countries, no bought-in assemblies. This is the condition the company upholds, even when it involves economic effort.

The consequence of this production philosophy is visible in the numbers: a defect rate that serves as an industry benchmark, a two-year manufacturer's warranty, and a robustness that results in Marcato machines from the 1970s and 1980s still in operation. This is the logical consequence of replacing plastic gears with steel gears, of manufacturing rollers from oxidation-resistant aluminium, and of every screw leaving the same factory as the machine it sits in. The production philosophy also includes waste handling: production residues are consistently recycled. Marcato describes this as a circular principle and has integrated it into all manufacturing processes.

The Atlas – Icon, Tool, Benchmark

The Atlas is not simply Marcato's best-known product. It is a reference in industrial design: a machine so clearly designed for its purpose that no question remains open. Two steel rollers, an adjustment knob for dough thickness, a hand crank, a side clamp for the table and a slot into which the interchangeable cutting attachments click. That is all. There is nothing one does not need, and nothing is missing that one needs.

The dough sheet passes through the rollers at up to ten different thicknesses – from nearly five millimetres for rough initial passes to under one millimetre for paper-thin ravioli dough. The oxidation-resistant aluminium rollers give the dough a slightly rough texture that is not levelled by coatings. This roughness is not a flaw – it is the reason Marcato pasta absorbs sauce differently from industrially dried pasta. The Atlas is available in several versions: manual with hand crank, motorised with the optional Pastadrive motor for hands-free rolling, and in the newer Atlas+ version with extended functionality. Compatible with 13 different cutting attachments for fettuccine, tagliolini, spaghetti, lasagne sheets, pappardelle and further formats.

The Range – From the Machine to the Last Detail

Pasta machines form the core range, but Marcato thinks the pasta topic through completely. Ravioli moulds in various sizes and geometries enable simple production of filled pasta without special technique: lay down a dough sheet, add filling, lay a second sheet on top, press down with a rolling pin, done. The serrated or straight pastry wheel blade cuts pasta sheets to the desired width or shape – more precisely and cleanly than a knife, because the blade applies even pressure across the entire cut line. The pasta drying rack holds freshly formed pasta suspended and ventilated for drying – because unevenly dried pasta sticks together or breaks. The range is complemented by tools for bread, pizza, pastry and grain milling.

Pasta machines · Ravioli moulds · Pastry wheels · Pasta drying racks · Cutting attachments & accessories

Marcato at miniSchoggi

Homemade pasta needs no preparation, no prior knowledge and no specialist ingredients. It needs durum wheat semolina, eggs, a little water and thirty minutes. What results has a different texture, a different bite and a different aroma from anything that comes out of a packet – not because the dough is more complicated, but because freshly rolled dough is different. The slightly rough, porous surface binds sauce. The freshness affects the cooking point. The ability to determine colour and flavour by adding vegetable powders opens an entire spectrum of variants that no supermarket packet can replicate.

The tool required for this must work. Roll evenly, cut cleanly, stand stable – and do so after the hundredth use exactly as after the first. Marcato machines from the 1970s are still running. Not because they were repaired, but because they did not break. That is the promise behind 90 years of Made in Italy from a single factory – and it proves itself simply and directly in the daily kitchen. miniSchoggi carries Marcato because the range suits everyone who wants to decide for themselves what comes to the table – and in what shape, colour and consistency. The range available at miniSchoggi includes pasta machines, ravioli moulds, pastry wheels and pasta drying racks and is continuously expanded.

1930. Campodarsego, Province of Padua. Still the same factory. Still Made in Italy. Marcato.