New JerseyFloridaItalyAlgheroColledimacine · Nonno’s hometownTurin
My sister and I grew up Italian American in New Jersey, with immigrant grandparents and a real love for Italy — not as a vacation brochure, but as who we were. As we got older, that pull only got stronger. Each of us found our own way back.
I went to Italy for the first time as a teenager with my Nonno. It changed me. I’ve been back many times since. Today I’m an Italian citizen — and so are my sister and my cousin. Different chapters. Same roots.
Different paths back
Gabriella
She left New Jersey for college in Florida — and eventually the whole family followed south. A few years later she took the bigger leap: she lives in Turin now, building her life and creative work from Italy. Sure enough, the rest of the family is trying to follow. Follow her as Guidance with Gab — also on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube.
Vincent
My cousin took the leap of actually moving — a multi-generational family move to Alghero, on the island of Sardinia. Building a life there meant community, language, and a lot of planning ahead for residency and citizenship paperwork. His path is the “go live there” chapter of the same story.
Mine
Stay close to the documents, dig into the tree, and help the next generation of our family through the process.
Digging deeper
The next chapter for me is helping my parents — and learning just how deep our roots go. With basic family documents and careful research online, I’ve been able to trace our family back generations. Finding people in our line who were alive in the 1700s didn’t feel like trivia. It felt like meeting myself across time.
That’s when it clicked: the hard part usually isn’t caring about Italy. It’s keeping the packet straight — messy PDFs, spelling mismatches, missing civil acts, and folders that don’t tell you what’s still open.
So I built Atto
Atto is a local-first desktop kit. You collect your own Italian civil records. You keep them in a vault on your computer. Atto does not decide anyone’s eligibility. It gives you a private, approve-only place for the documents you collect — you make the calls. Mac and Windows are both first-class desktop kits; Linux is available with clear labels.
This is
A private, approve-only place for the documents you collect
Suggest-only research help — you approve what goes into your tree
This isn’t
A law firm, an eligibility service, or a government office
A magic genealogy bot that quietly upgrades a maybe into a fact
A cloud family tree that owns your data
If you want someone else to run the entire citizenship case for you, hire a professional. If you want a calm place on your computer to keep your family’s records while you DIY the organizing layer — that’s Atto.
Who it’s for
People who already feel the pull — Italian American families, siblings helping parents, cousins comparing notes — and need less chaos in the paperwork, not another chatbot promising a passport.
It’s also for law firms and paralegals who help clients with Italian citizenship packets. Put Atto on a Mac or Windows PC in the office: staff organize civil records, spot gaps, and keep client files local — while the firm owns the attorney work and the relationship. The kit is a one-time cost; the organizing hours you save (and can bill) are the leverage.