This museum has a unique collection of memoirs, fragments of life, testimonies, preserved over the years by
hoteliers, waiters and cooks around the world, kept as evidence of their activities. Armeno is famous for being
the home of the hoteliers, not only that, a historical legend tells that this town learnt the art of "managing of the
house" and "table serving" the Lombard nobles who, in order to escape the plague that broke out in the 17th century,
moved to Armeno.
In the museum you can see items of work such as, kitchen tools, photographs, collections of vintage
newspapers, menus of famous meetings, books and rare books of recipes along with many other documents that make this
place an authentic jewel of originality and suggestiveness.
Open: July and August
Gignese: The Umbrella and Parasol Museum
The Gignese Museum is the only one in the world devoted to umbrellas and parasols; its collection comprises over a thousand examples of umbrellas, parasols and handles.
Some items are curiosities, or of considerable historical and cultural importance, like the umbrellas that belonged to Queen Margherita of Savoy or the Risorgimento patriot and politician
Giuseppe Mazzini. The showcases display finely made and exquisitely decorated umbrellas, which visitors will find intriguing and ravishingly pretty. The section devoted to the life of the
umbrella-makers includes photographs of pioneer craftsmen, rudimentary tools from workshops of the past, and the tools that the umbrella makers/menders used when they plied their trade in
the streets of Italy and throughout the world.
The Museum takes us on a journey through a corner of history, full of images and memorabilia of an ancient trade that the local umbrella makers took successfully all over the world.
Boleto: Stonemason Museum
Boleto is a village that lays on top of a granite formation. The new museum was born from the
desire to enhance a profession that, for about two centuries, characterized this area above Lake Orta.
The main interest of the Museum is focused on the hard and dangerous work of the stonecutters, who worked
in the early 19th century, involving the ups and downs of many families and local communities. The Museum
displays tools, manufactured articles, documents, but above all, it "tells", through videos and historical and
iconographical researches, the stonemason's profession, in which the inhabitants of this area were famous
masters all over the world.
The "migliarolo" of Alzo, a particular granite, was considered, in the times of its highest extractive expanssivity,
the best white granite in Europe. The handmade products patiently carved by the stonemasons were exported
all over the world and still today they adorn streets and houses of many towns.
Besides the museum, it is also possible to visit, in the hamlet of Centonara, an ancient millstone for hemp and nut
processing: a recently restored building that testifies a characteristic activity of the area, and where it is
possible to admire one of the many granite handmade product carved by our stonemasons.
Open: July and August and first Sunday in winter months
San Maurizio d'Opaglio: The Tap Museum
The Tap Museum, with its unique exhibits, does not only trace the history of San Maurizio d'Opaglio and surrounding
district, famous for and specialised in the manufacture of taps and valves but, above all, displays the many themes relating to the
purifying of water and the use of water sources which the technology of the tap has always had to face.
The Museum chronicles the social history of water and the innovations which allowed to dominate it, transforming the cure of
the body from an élite practice into a mass phenomenon.
Reconstructing the history of the tap and fittings industry in the Novara area means reconstructing the social and industrial
history of Italy in the post-unification era.
