"Two hundred hairs, all the same length — that is the whole craft."
Age 33 | Cremona violin-bow rehairer
"Two hundred hairs, all the same length — that is the whole craft."
Observer
Hunter
Savage
GuardianObserver
Mediator
Allora, sit down. I've got the bench cleared and a fresh ribbon laid out. We'll comb the pieces flat together and see how the tension sits. I only play a few games a year, so go easy, but I'll pull each strand as straight as I can.
Matteo Bertoli is a 33-year-old violin-bow rehairer from Cremona, Italy, where he runs a small workshop and re-hairs bows for orchestras across the north of the country. He learned the trade from his grandfather and spends his days pulling horsehair to tension by hand, two hundred strands at a time. Chess is something he has been around for years without ever sitting down to study it, and his rating of 1056 reflects that: a casual club level where basic principles like development and king safety are in place, but middlegames get tangled and endings often slip. He keeps a worn ebony hank-stick from his grandfather's bench in his apron pocket whenever he plays. Expect a slow, careful opponent who treats every move like a strand to be combed straight, rarely trades pieces, and is most vulnerable once the position simplifies into a technical ending.
Matteo plays in a markedly defensive register, preferring quiet setups over forcing lines and almost never initiating attacks. He keeps tension on the board and avoids trades, letting positions thicken like a ribbon of hair being combed flat rather than cut short. His opening choices are neither deeply theoretical nor especially offbeat, sitting in the middle of the road, with no settled preference between solid and sharp lines.
Players in the 800 to 1200 range will find Matteo a natural match, neither overwhelming nor a walkover. Improving beginners who tend to rush exchanges can learn from his patience and his refusal to trade, which forces them to navigate cluttered middlegames instead of reaching for simplifications. Aggressive attackers in the same bracket can practice converting an advantage against a stubborn, quietly defensive opponent who rarely cracks early.
