Musei Civici d'Arte Antica

Situated inside Villa Spada, the prestigious building designed by Giovanni Battista Martinetti in the 1790s at the request of Giacomo Zambeccari, the museum includes large exhibition spaces, storage areas, conference room, a library, offices and a restoration workshop.

At the death of Giacomo Zambeccari the house passed from his heirs to the family of Prince Clemente Veralli Spada. In 1964, the city bought it from the Pisa family and opened the park to the public.

Inside the building there are numerous sculptures, some of them attributable to the renowned artist Giacomo De Maria. The building also has visible traces of painted decoration work by Serafino Barozzi and Filippo Pedrini.

The collection of materials held in the museum was the work of Vittorio Zironi, upholsterer by profession and connoisseur of textiles, who, with the help of colleagues and collectors starting immediately in the post-war period, in just a few years formed a collection of great value both in terms of variety and quality. Initially the collection focused mainly on fabrics, accessories and tools used for centuries to produce tapestries.

As time passed the collection began to include finished products, such as clothing, embroidered items, drawings, archival materials and a highly specialised library.

The oldest fragments in the museum are Coptic textiles, while items of western origin (even local) and the Near and Middle East cover a period of several centuries, from the Middle Ages to the late nineteenth century.

Of these, worthy of note are the Ottoman caftans of the 18th and 19th centuries. Considerable space is devoted to oriental and Italian handmade embroidery.

The museum's particularly significant core collection has been enriched over the years, today including even liturgical clothes and accessories (often embroidered with threads of gold and silver) made of the finest silks and trimmings.

Other donations have included clothes designed by some famous local tailors, making it possible to race a brief history of 20th century fashion.

The prestige of the collection is also enhanced by the presence of equipment used in the various stages of fabric production, starting with large looms.

One of particular note is the 18th century loom that was upgraded in the 19th century with a Jacquard punch card system, an extraordinary example of technological evolution during the Industrial Revolution.

An entire room is dedicated to the tools used for the preparation of materials required by upholsterers, and other equipment employed in the different stages of work.

In recent years the museum has distinguished itself both in conservation, thanks to the work of its renowned in-house restoration laboratory, and in education, in some cases even putting into operation some ancient equipment or experimenting with weaving using some small modern looms.

ACCESS TEMPORARILY SUSPENDED FOR EXTRAORDINARY MAINTENANCE PROVISION