How does a biopharmaceutical executive from Verona end up becoming Cincinnati’s sole purveyor of luxury Italian kitchens? Good question. For Agostino Fede, owner and founder of NOLI, it went something like this: After retiring from corporate life, Fede moved to New York City, where he began, as he puts it, a sort of grand “rewiring.” The question, he says, was simple—if a bit belated at age 49.

“What do I want to be when I grow up?” With a knack for interiors and a background in laboratory design, kitchens felt like a natural fit. “It’s very analytical—very much for engineers like me,” Fede says. “A kitchen needs to be precise.”