SILVIA VENTURINI FENDI ON HER ISLAND HOME ON PONZA

Ponza, a tranquil island surrounded by emerald water off the coast of Rome, has never attracted the sort of glittering Italian jet-setters who require high-heeled sea frolicking. "It's always been such a quiet island," says Silvia Venturini Fendi, who has been coming here since she was a child. "But these days, uncool places are becoming cool, so now — well, everyone is coming."

Venturini Fendi couldn't care less about the island's cool factor or the megayacht parking in Ponza's tiny port. Her home, a peaceful oasis surrounded by lush vegetation in Le Forna, provides a totally private space and a welcome retreat from her busy life in Rome as Fendi's creative director of accessories.

Known as Casa Madonna, the home was purchased by her mother, Anna, one of the five famed Fendi sisters who rocketed the Roman label to the stratosphere of chic in the 1960s. Anna, who already had two other properties on the island, bought three homes as gifts for each of her daughters more than a decade ago. "Each house was designed to fit our character," Venturini Fendi says, noting that her younger sister, Maria Ilaria, is stationed in the busy port where all the island action takes place.

The cliff-top Casa Madonna, on the other hand, reflects this designer's introspective leanings. "Coming here is a way to connect with myself," she remarks, "and it's a great break from regular life." Here, she leads a simple, makeupless existence of leisurely meals, sun-soaked boat floats, and trips to the local emporium for plastic fishermen's sandals and black funeral dresses. One would hardly believe that this is the residence of the woman who created one of the biggest It bags of all time, the Fendi Baguette.

Practically the only sign that the house is on serious fashion terra is Venturini Fendi's bedroom, which features a coat hanger blanketed with Fendi handbags, from '60s vintage styles to her present-day design hits, like the Peekaboo and Spy bags. "For some people, this is just a logo," she says of the double f's on a '60s tote. "But for me, it's like having all of my things monogrammed."

That double f seems to have the magic touch. Not only was Venturini Fendi's mother the former head of the creative studio at Fendi (she worked alongside Karl Lagerfeld, who still designs the house's ready-to-wear), but her daughter Delfina Delettrez, 22, is now an independent Rome-based jewelry designer garnering a cult following with her own bug-laden designs. Two-year-old Emma, Delfina's daughter, is next in line for a fashionable Fendi life.

"Delfina always sleeps with spiders in her room," Venturini Fendi observes of her daughter's Ponza quarters, while she herself coos over a gigantic stag beetle gorging on her breakfast cake. "It looks like one of Delfina's rings!" she says delightedly.

With Casa Madonna's multiple spacious terraces, including an alfresco "disco" area and outdoor spaces that seamlessly extend into an internal tangle of cozy, colorful tiled rooms, it's no wonder that Venturini Fendi hosts a troop of dinosaur-size insects. The more the merrier is the unwritten motto of the eight-bedroom house. "I can sleep 20 people here," she says, "but it's never enough."

Though expansive, the home is full of tiny nooks and crannies that inform its personal vibe. The layered interiors reflect years of Venturini Fendi's passionate collecting, from antique furniture and blue door frames shipped from Turkey to broken shards of majolica tiles, which cover walls and floors in splendid mosaic patterns. "I love everything that has an important tie with the past," says Venturini Fendi, who spends every vacation submerged in vintage markets. "Completely new things scare me.

"I used to spend hours as a child at flea markets with my mom," she continues. "Now I do the same with my children. When we go on vacation, my kids freak out because they know the main mission of the trip is to gather research."

Fittingly, she often collects discarded doors and shattered windows. She uses Vatican postcards as invitations and picks up nightgowns, pleated skirts, and wool cardigans from a nuns' uniform shop in Rome. "Their clothes have the best quality, and they aren't expensive," she explains. The sisters would be impressed by Casa Madonna's walls, which are stuffed with religious relics and mother-of-God iconography. "I can look at them for hours," she says, "and after, I call up the office with my design ideas."

As a child, Venturini Fendi lived in Rome's Villa Barberini, a former prince's estate with a no-toys-allowed policy and posters hidden on the insides of closets. "I had frescoes in my room, so what else could I do?" She attended her first fashion show while still in her mother's womb, has baby pictures with Karl Lagerfeld, and began working at her family's company at the age of 18. In 1987, she was named creative director of Fendissime, and she moved to the main label in 1994.

In 2001, LVMH bought the Roman fashion label, but Venturini Fendi wasn't necessarily part of the package. "They could have fired me," she recalls, "but they didn't, and I am very grateful to Bernard Arnault for that because it gave me a sense of independence and recognition. For a long time, people thought that I was only in the company because of my family."

Despite that double-f monogram, no one today could ever attribute her lofty position to nepotism. "Fashion," she observes casually, "comes naturally. I've always just lived it."