1 hour ago
2
Imagine finishing a meal at an Italian restaurant and leaving with the plate on which your food was served. It sounds unusual, but for more than six decades, a group of Italian restaurants has turned this simple piece of tableware into a lasting souvenir.
Known as the Piatti del Buon Ricordo, or “Plates of Good Memory”, the tradition began in 1964 with an idea to promote Italy's regional cuisine and encourage diners to discover local specialities. Participating restaurants offer specially designed ceramic plates featuring images linked to their signature dishes, restaurants or surrounding areas. Diners who order the designated speciality can take the commemorative plate home, creating a physical reminder of their meal and journey.
More than 60 years after the tradition began, the practice continues across Italy and beyond.
How Italy turned restaurant plates into souvenirs
The story began in 1964, when advertising executive and cultural promoter Dino Villani helped establish the Unione Ristoranti del Buon Ricordo. Twelve restaurants came together in Milan in April that year to promote an idea centred on Italy's regional cooking. At the time, traditional regional cuisine was competing for attention with French-influenced cooking, and Villani wanted to encourage greater appreciation of the dishes and culinary identities found across Italy.
The organisation created an unusual way of connecting food with memory. Participating restaurants would offer a distinctive local speciality and provide diners with a ceramic plate designed to commemorate that dish and the place where it was served. The concept transformed a restaurant meal into something that could be remembered long after the diner had left.The plates associated with Buon Ricordo are not simply the ordinary dinner plates used by restaurants.
They are specially designed commemorative ceramics produced for the programme. Each participating restaurant has its own plate, generally featuring an illustration connected with its signature speciality, local ingredients, town or surrounding area. The name Buon Ricordo translates roughly as “good memory”, reflecting the purpose behind the objects.
Instead of leaving diners with only the memory of a meal, the tradition gives them something physical to take home and display.
The plate therefore represents both the food they ate and the place where they experienced it.
Why diners can take the plates home
The souvenir is tied to the restaurant's designated Buon Ricordo speciality or menu. A diner who orders the relevant offering receives the commemorative plate as part of the tradition. This is why it would be misleading to suggest that customers at these restaurants can simply remove any plate from the table after eating.
The programme specifically involves plates created as souvenirs for participating restaurants.
The unusual arrangement was designed to strengthen the connection between a regional dish and the memory of visiting the restaurant where it was served.
Each plate represents a different place and dish
One of the most distinctive features of the collection is that every restaurant's plate can tell a different story. The artwork may show the restaurant's signature dish, an ingredient associated with the speciality or an image connected with the local area.
This creates a visual link between cuisine and geography. A diner collecting plates from different restaurants can therefore build a record of regional Italian food through the designs on the ceramics.
The plate is not just a souvenir carrying a restaurant name. It is intended to represent the culinary identity of the place and the speciality that the restaurant has chosen to promote.
The tradition quickly became a collecting hobby
The idea grew rapidly after its launch. The original 12 restaurants had more than doubled by the end of the 1960s, while membership approached 100 by the end of the 1970s.
In 1977, a separate Association of Collectors was established, reflecting the growing interest in the plates themselves. Travellers could visit participating restaurants, sample their regional specialities and take home the corresponding ceramic.
Over time, collections became a way of documenting journeys through Italy, with each plate serving as a physical reminder of a particular restaurant, dish and destination.
The plates are hand-painted in Italy
The ceramics have traditionally been produced in Vietri sul Mare on the Amalfi Coast, an area with a long-established reputation for ceramics. The Buon Ricordo organisation says the plates are made using clay associated with the area and are hand-painted by artisans. This craftsmanship gives the souvenirs a character that distinguishes them from ordinary mass-produced tourist merchandise. Each restaurant's design is created specifically around its food and local identity, meaning the finished plate becomes a small piece of culinary and artistic representation of that place.Graphic designer Paolo Argenton has designed the Buon Ricordo plates since 1985. His role has been to translate each restaurant's speciality and territory into a distinctive ceramic design. Restaurants identify the dish they want to represent, while the artwork can incorporate other visual references to the surrounding area. The result is a collection in which the plates share the same broad tradition but retain individual identities.
This consistency combined with variety has helped make the ceramics recognisable as part of the Buon Ricordo tradition while giving collectors a reason to seek out plates from different restaurants.
The idea was about protecting regional cuisine
The plates were never intended to be merely decorative souvenirs. Villani's wider goal was to promote Italy's regional culinary traditions and encourage diners to explore foods associated with different territories.
The restaurant network provided a way to connect individual dishes with their local origins, while the plate gave diners a physical reminder of that experience. In this sense, the tradition became a form of culinary promotion and cultural preservation.
Each restaurant was expected to have a strong connection with its territory and its designated speciality, reinforcing the idea that Italian cuisine is made up of many distinct regional traditions rather than one uniform national menu.
The tradition spread beyond Italy
The Buon Ricordo idea eventually crossed Italy's borders. According to the organisation's official history, the movement began expanding internationally during the 1980s. Restaurants outside Italy subsequently joined the network, allowing the tradition of regional Italian cuisine and commemorative plates to continue in other countries. The international restaurants became part of the same broader effort to promote Italian food culture, while giving diners abroad an opportunity to participate in a tradition that originated in Milan more than six decades ago.As the tradition grew, the plates developed a life beyond the restaurants that issued them. Collectors began searching for older and rarer examples, and vintage Buon Ricordo ceramics can now be found through collectors, antique markets and other secondary sources. The dedicated collectors' association, which dates back to 1977, reflects the depth of this interest. For some collectors, the appeal lies in the artwork and craftsmanship, while for others the plates represent memories of meals and journeys through different parts of Italy.
A collection can consequently function almost like a visual travel diary, with each plate representing a different stop.
More than 60 years later, the tradition continues
The tradition is still active rather than simply being a relic of Italy's culinary past. The organisation's 2026 guide lists 111 participating establishments, including 103 in Italy and eight abroad. The number has changed considerably over the decades, so older reports may give different totals, but the current guide provides the latest official figure. What began with 12 restaurants in 1964 has therefore survived for more than six decades and continues to connect restaurants, regional dishes and commemorative ceramics.
