Villa Spada - Museo della Tappezzeria

Villa Spada houses the Museo del Tessuto e della Tappezzeria Vittorio Zironi, a collection of textiles, looms and upholstery tools assembled by the Bolognese master upholsterer Vittorio Zironi. The museum's holdings span decorated fabrics used in domestic and sacred settings.

Why it matters

Zironi began collecting in 1946, bringing together objects that document the materials and techniques of textile decoration. The city acquired the family's collection in 2016, and the museum reopened at Villa Spada in 2017. Its holdings make the villa a centre for the study of upholstery, woven fabrics and the craft traditions behind them.

What to notice

The collection includes Italian silks from the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries, as well as textiles from Turkish, Persian, Caucasian and Indian workshops. Coptic fragments from Egypt form an early layer. Among the working objects are a Lombard damask loom converted to the Jacquard system in 1801, a galloon loom dated to 1370 and seventeenth-century oak matrices used to stamp patterns into leather. Guild banners, a restoration laboratory and a specialist study library broaden the collection's view of textile craft.

Context and history

Villa Spada probably took shape in the late eighteenth century under Iacopo Zambeccari. The Spada family acquired it in 1820, and the municipality took ownership in the 1960s. Zironi's museum first opened at Palazzo Salina Brazzetti in 1966 and moved to Villa Spada in 1990. The family's donation of more than 6,000 objects was accepted by the city in 2016. A renewed display opened in October 2017, presenting about 2,500 pieces across the villa's three floors. The museum's specialist library preserves the history of textile craft in Bologna.