Barbara Zichichi has been appointed as the new honorary consul of Italy in Connecticut. Zichichi was born and raised in the town of Verona in northeast Italy, which is best known as the setting for William Shakespeare’s famed Romeo and Juliet. After studying foreign languages in high school, she worked as a translator and interpreter across her native country after attending a translating institute in Bologna.

She moved to the United States in 1999 and joined her husband, Fabrizio, who was working in New York. Now a Stamford resident, she has two children - a son and a daughter. For the past 20 years, Zichichi has served on various boards around the state and focused her attention on non-profit organizations with an emphasis on education, drug rehabilitation, and health care for senior citizens.