Museo di ceramiche antiche Giuseppe Gianetti

Visiting the Giuseppe Gianetti Museum of Saronno is like entering a house of the 1930s that's still inhabited.

The exhibits include objects that accompanied collector Giuseppe Gianetti throughout his daily life. The museum features various paintings, sculptures and furniture purchased from antique shops and galleries in Rome, Milan and Turin.

Driven by a passion for research in the field of plastic and visual arts, in 1932 Gianetti shifted his interest from paintings to ceramics, which he only purchased if they were "pristine", or rather perfectly intact. The collection includes more than 600 pieces, for which even the correspondence with the antique dealers is documented, including invoices, bills, and thank-you letters for the goods received.

Some particularly noteworthy exhibits include the 201 fine Meissen porcelain pieces, dating from the early 1700s up until the early decades of the nineteenth century, as well as various pieces of European, Oriental and Italian china, not to mention a rare sculpture by the Venetian porcelain factory Hewelcke and the eighteenth century majolica pottery of Italian and European origins.

The rare 18th century works, which know few equals worldwide, have rendered the museum famous on a national and European-wide scale. The museum borrows entire sets of china from various foreign museums, including those of Dresden, a city whose passion for ceramics knows few rivals.

The Italian Educational Guidance Centre supports the museum by providing meticulous research and cataloguing services, as well as by preserving and restoring the pieces themselves and promoting the museum's activities. With the aim of helping young people engage with the world of art and creating a bridge between the ancient and the contemporary, the museum has recently opened a section dedicated to contemporary ceramics and a library of the decorative arts.

It also features temporary exhibitions, including the biannual project for young artists known as Coffeebreak.museum. The educational division's activities include themed "animated" tours and workshops, during which the children not only learn how to appreciate the artworks themselves, but also how they are made and the manual, visual and mental processes that contributed to their realization.