Maccarrone: Italian Handcrafted Humidors and Marquetry

Maccarrone is an Italian cigar humidor maker working in marquetry, and it is one of the very few houses in this category where the word handcrafted is meant literally. The company is registered as Maccarrone Furniture SRL in Camaiore, in the province of Lucca in Tuscany, and it states that production takes place entirely in Tuscany. A single piece takes two to four months to size, sand, mill, assemble and varnish.

Cigar Inc. is an official United States distributor for Maccarrone, alongside Brizard and Co., and our Maccarrone collection runs from the 40 count Dolce Vita through to a 200 count Swamp Alligator limited edition. This profile covers the family, the workshop, the three collections, the woods, and how a Maccarrone humidor is actually built inside.

The family behind the workshop

The woodworking line starts in 1922, when Agatino Maccarrone began making handcrafted chairs in a Sicilian village at the foot of Mount Etna. Five generations later the trade had moved north. Giuseppe Maccarrone built yacht and sailboat furnishings in Viareggio, which is the detail that explains a great deal about the finished product: a Maccarrone lid closes the way a boat locker closes.

Cristian Francesco Maccarrone was born in Palermo in 1993 and moved to Viareggio at seven. His interest in cigars began in 2018 in Ibiza, he left his job, and he founded Maccarrone in 2020. The workshop sits in Camaiore, a few minutes from the Versilia coast, and the company describes its process as sizing, sanding, milling, assembly and varnishing, with each piece taking two to four months.

That is a very short history for a house at this price point, and it is worth being clear about it. What Maccarrone brings is not a hundred years of its own brand. It is a hundred years of the family's cabinetmaking applied to a category that had been dominated by two or three names for decades.

The three collections: Essenza, Yacht and Masterpiece

Maccarrone organises everything into three named collections, and knowing which one a model belongs to tells you most of what you need to know about it.

Essenza

The most minimal line: clean surfaces, rare natural woods and a high gloss finish, with no pictorial marquetry. This is where the Macassar Ebony 40, the Walnut Burl 40, the Poplar Burl 40 and the Anthracite Carbalho 150 live. If you want the material to be the whole statement, this is the collection.

Yacht

Inspired by the boats, and the collection that traces most directly back to Giuseppe Maccarrone's yacht furnishing work. Dolcevita, Amalfi, Supersport and Blue Ocean sit here. The Supersport 40 carries an 80 millimetre miniature chromed brass porthole with clear plexiglass set into the lid, which is exactly the kind of detail a boat builder thinks of and a furniture maker does not.

Masterpiece

The most elaborate work, built around marquetry and often incorporating precious stones, resins and rare metals. La Habana, Starry Night, Venice, Dea Tyche, Chinese Temple, Rinascimento, World Map and Skull Resin belong here, mostly in numbered limited editions.

Four ways into the line

Two Yacht collection 40 counts, one Yacht 75, and one Masterpiece resin piece, so you can see the range in one screen.

The woods and the marquetry

Marquetry is the art of building a picture out of veneer. Maccarrone laser cuts the elements and then assembles them by hand, which is why a World Map or a Starry Night lid can hold fifteen or more species without a visible seam. The named woods in the catalogue include Erable, Walnut Burl, Tanganika Frisè in white, Blue Sycomoro Frisè, Grey Eucaliptus Pomelè, Toulipier in grey, red and dark grey, Tay wood dyed yellow, Macassar Ebony, Poplar Burl, Paduka, Zebra Wood and Anthracite Carbalho.

The finish is high gloss and hand polished, not sprayed and left. Hardware is chromed brass throughout. Where a piece uses stone, resin or metal inlay it is stated as such rather than implied.

If you want to see how differently two houses can treat the same problem, put a Maccarrone lid next to a piece from Brizard and Co.. Brizard sands exotic timber and finishes it in teak oil for a matte, tactile surface. Maccarrone builds a picture in veneer and polishes it to a mirror. Both are correct, and they suit different rooms.

What is inside a Maccarrone humidor

The interior is lined in cedrella odorosa, the Spanish cedar species that does the real work in any humidor: it holds moisture, it discourages tobacco beetle, and it adds its own aroma to a cigar over months. Maccarrone states the lining species explicitly, which most makers do not.

Beyond the cedar, the specification runs to one or two acrylic polymer humidifiers, one German synthetic hygrometer, removable and height adjustable trays and drawers, and adjustable dividers. Capacity is quoted in both Robusto and Churchill counts, which is a more honest way to state it than a single number, because a 150 count in Robustos is not a 150 count in Churchills.

For a broader comparison across cabinet types, our desktop humidors and electronic humidors pages sit alongside this collection, and the full humidor range holds everything at once.

The models we carry

Our selection spans all three collections. La Habana is the marquetry cabinet the house is best known for, Rinascimento and Venice are the Renaissance and Venetian Masterpiece pieces, and the Swamp Alligator 200 is the largest limited edition we hold.

Fuente, Brizard and S.T. Dupont

Maccarrone's profile in the cigar world rose sharply through Les Chaînes de l'Amour, a project with Arturo Fuente and Brizard and Co. The humidors combined Maccarrone marquetry with Brizard leatherwork in black, blue and red, and the sets included unreleased Fuente Fuente OpusX cigars. The one off auction cabinet was built by Cristian Maccarrone in Italy, finished in ostrich leather in California, held 120 Fuente Fuente OpusX 25 Double Coronas, and sold for 150,000 dollars.

The same four houses then produced Le Grand, a lighter with S.T. Dupont: Maccarrone burl walnut and tulipwood marquetry on one face, Brizard ostrich leather on the other, S.T. Dupont's mechanism underneath. It was the first marquetry in S.T. Dupont's history, limited to 99 pieces at 5,700 dollars. Maccarrone has also worked with the Italian artist Michael Pardini on selected pieces.

We carry pieces from both projects. They sit in Maccarrone accessories and in our Arturo Fuente collection.

What we notice first-hand

Two observations from handling these.

The first is the seal. Because the family came out of yacht joinery, the lid to body fit on a Maccarrone is tighter than the price bracket alone would predict, and it is the reason these hold humidity well with only one or two polymer humidifiers rather than a bank of them. You can hear it when you close one.

The second is that the Yacht collection photographs and lives better than it reads. Turquoise, cream and chromed brass sound like a lot on paper. In a room with light coming off water they are exactly right, which is why the Supersport and the Amalfi tend to go to the same customers who buy the turquoise Brizard Positano accessories.

A word on availability, since it matters at this level: most Masterpiece pieces are numbered limited editions and we typically hold one of each. When a piece sells, it is usually gone rather than restocked.

The full Maccarrone collection, live

Browse all Maccarrone

The bottom line

Maccarrone is the choice when you want an Italian handmade humidor with visible craft on the outside and correct engineering on the inside, and when a numbered piece matters to you. Start in the Yacht or Essenza collections at 40 or 75 count if this is your first cabinet at this level, and treat the Masterpiece pieces as what they are, which is furniture you will keep.

If you are still deciding between a wood humidor and an electronic cabinet, the humidor collection lets you compare both in one place, and our team will talk it through on the phone.

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