COLLECT TO INSPIRE
MUSEO STORICO ALFA ROMEO
1 June 2025 • Written By Marius Pop
Marchionne realised that the heritage of the Milan-founded brand is unrivalled and the depth of its backcatalog can provide a wealth of inspiration not just to the lifelong fans, but also to a new generation that wasn’t lucky enough to have been exposed to it already. The year 2015 marked the re-opening of Museo Storico Alfa Romeo, standing exactly where the once-mighty Arese plant churned one Giulia after another in its 1960s heyday. Today, the task of keeping alive the untouchable spirit of the brand, is in the hands of its current custodian, Lorenzo Ardizio, a car designer, writer, publicist and academic with almost two decades of involvement with the brand.
You always feel a little special here, why do you think that is?
It’s not the museum being special, it’s the fact that the Museum reflects the brand. And the brand itself is special.
It’s an inclusive brand that leaves no one out. Inside the Museum you meet top collectors who have pre-war cars worth millions, chatting to simple Alfa owners. Alfa Romeo’s ability to unite passion is fundamental. The museum wants to keep this type of attitude alive.
What does it mean for you to welcome Alfisti from all over the world here, on this sacred ground?
The exchange with people is always an enrichment. You get to know stories, you get to know details, you get to know automobiles as well as events that are interesting to discover, so it’s not just a welcoming, but a meeting. I think there’s great collaboration between the Museum and the world of worldwide collectors.
What is the central core of the collection?
When Luigi Fusi was tasked with putting together the first Museum core, his task was not to collect everything, but was to create a visual reconstruction of the history and values of the brand. So he committed himself at the time to try to touch what were the important narrative points in order to tell what Alfa Romeo is. So we’re looking for a synthesis that explains what Alfa Romeo is. But then there are also objects that have an intrinsic value, because they are unique and precious objects. We have the first Alfa, the 24 HP, we have the P2 that won the World Championship, we have the Alfettas, we have the 8C 2900 Le Mans, we have the prototype of the 33 Stradale, many of the prototypes and concepts that never saw the greenlight to production. I think the heart of the museum collection is this: the ability to show at least something of each aspect making up the myth of Alfa Romeo, sometimes doing this through unique objects.
LIVING HISTORY – ARTURO MERZARIO
The cars are the usual source of inspiration at Museo Storico, but on special days it’s also the place where you can run into a piece of living history of the brand
“More than 50 years have passed since I started with the Alfa Tipo 33 that won the world championship in ‘75 and ‘77,” says Arturo Merzario, known to the non-Alfisti as the Formula 1 driver who jumped into a smoldering wreckage in order to pull Niki Lauda out of his Ferrari at the time of that horrific 1976 accident. “In 1974 I was right here at Alfa Romeo headquarters for the first time, on the testing track of that era, so being here brings back a fascinating memory.” Lauda himself had a later stint in an Alfa-powered Brabham Formula 1 car, because, as Arturo puts it, “Alfa Romeo is the mother of motorsport all over the world.”
On the day he is reunited with his championship-winning ride, the 82 year-old still wearing his iconic cowboy hat is all smiles. “Everything still works on this car. And what’s meaningful is that it’s my real car: my seat, my position, my steering wheel, and the gear shift knob I had made of birch wood to not ruin my hands with blisters.”
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