Ambassador of Creativity since 2022

Starting in 2020, Alba, as a UNESCO Creative City for Gastronomy, has decided to establish the position of Ambassador of Creativity , choosing among prominent personalities who have made genius their most important weapon, helping to make Alba's name known throughout the world.

After Valerio Berruti , a multifaceted contemporary artist of international caliber, strongly rooted in the Langhe region, where he grew up and still lives, Luciano Tona , Director of the Bocuse d'or Italy Academy, former Director of Alma, the international school of Italian cuisine and staunch defender of the identity of the Langhe, Monferrato and Roero in the kitchen, has been chosen.

In the presence of the area's starred chefs, on the occasion of the opening of the photography exhibition " Etoiles, the stars of Langhe Monferrato and Roero cuisine " which took place on Thursday 20 October 2022 in the church of San Domenico in Alba, Tourism Councillor Emanuele Bolla appointed chef Luciano Tona as ambassador of the UNESCO Creative City 2022-2023 , inviting him to form a permanent group of colleagues, "a 'brigade', who can travel the world with us to tell the story of the Langhe, Monferrato and Roero area" . The councillor concluded: "Considering the high level of quality we have already achieved, without your hands, your intelligence, your creativity and talent we will not go far, and for this we thank you" .

Chef Luciano Tona accepts the invitation, emphasizing that many of his colleagues, like him, are not native to the area but have fallen in love with its uniqueness and gastronomic value, which still boasts many prospects to be explored.

Luciano's soul, sensitive and refined, acutely ironic, just like the cuisine he expressed during the years of his " Fermata" in Casatenovo (one Michelin star), makes him an excellent culinary technician who has shaped and oriented himself towards a polymorphic cuisine, a mix of instinct and technique, classicism and fusion contamination, rigor and subtle, sly provocation.

His cuisine is the fruit of research that has led him to the essence of simplicity and to recipes crafted from a few elements placed together in perfect harmony.

At the end of the year of nomination, it was decided to extend the duration of the recognition, both to underscore the importance of a name so closely linked to the food world and to establish the recognition and its nature.