Museum of Industrial Heritage

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description

This section is dedicated to machinery used for prepping, measuring and packaging, with examples of Bolognese products from the 1940s to the 1970s. Installed on the ground floor in the portico to the Hoffmann kiln, these fully operational prototypes are complemented by illustrative videos and captions. They document the principal product and process innovations that spelled success for this important industrial segment.

Bologna has long been an international leader in the packaging industry, which came to occupy its own industrial district in the period following World War II. Characterized by flexibility of specialization, the Bolognese machines gained renown for their ability to respond swiftly and continuously to customer demands.

Developing within a broader process of industrial progress, the packaging industry benefited from the presence of two major players in the mechanical industry, ACMA and SASIB. Active in the 1920s and ‘30s, the former produced a broad range of packaging machines for the pharmaceutical and food sectors while the latter developed methods for manufacturing and packaging cigarettes.

The well distributed presence of qualified, multi-specialized artisanal enterprises (performing a broad range of commissioned work) and the spread of expertise in mechanical engineering, thanks largely to the Aldini-Valeriani Institute, allowed many technicians and engineers to start their own businesses in the period starting at the end of WWII and continuing into the 1970s, helping to create Bologna’s modern-day packaging district.