ACdB - Museo Alessandria Città della Bicicletta

The ACdB museum traces Alessandria's cycling heritage and the province's history with the Giro d'Italia.

Why it matters

Alessandria is closely associated with the history of Italian cycling. The province is associated with the arrival of an early bicycle in Italy in 1867; the city later hosted Giro d'Italia stages and produced notable riders. The ACdB — "Alessandria Città delle Biciclette" — is a project of the local Chamber of Commerce and part of a territory with several cycling museums; it is formally twinned with the Museo del Ghisallo, the sport's Lombard sanctuary. Its collection includes memorabilia donated by the public, and the museum has presented exhibitions on the Giro d'Italia and notable figures in cycling.

What to notice

• The story of the first bicycle to reach Italy in 1867, and the province's pioneering role in the history of Italian cycling.
• The exhibition "Una provincia da pedalare" traces more than a century of Giro d'Italia figures, stages and local history.

• Virtual exhibitions have addressed Fiorenzo Magni, the Gerbi–Cuniolo rivalry and the history of the maglia rosa.

• The tribute to founders Giuseppe Meazzo and Giancarlo Dottino, whose donated collections seeded the museum.
• The setting itself: the third floor of Palazzo del Monferrato, a historic palace in the old centre, with cycling culture installed among baroque ceilings.

Context and history

The museum grew out of a local conviction that cycling memory deserved an institution of its own. Backed by the Chamber of Commerce, it opened as a permanent exhibition in Palazzo del Monferrato and immediately positioned itself in dialogue with the region's cycling museums, from the Ghisallo shrine downwards. The museum's cultural history includes Giro d'Italia exhibitions, talks with cycling historians and authors, and related public events. The city's broader two-wheel identity — from the first 1867 machine to Giro stage towns and the Coppi country of the surrounding Monferrato — gives the collection its narrative spine.