New Railway Exhibition in Florence: A Journey through Historic Carriages and Trams
HZERO is a constantly evolving project. Not only a train museum where you can admire highly valuable artisanal works of modeling and a fundamental stop for enthusiasts and the curious, but also a place of skill and dedication, of suggestions, and sensory settings arising from the encounter between different creative languages. Since June 2023, on the first floor of the museum, visitors can immerse themselves in a new exhibition, a true extension of the museum's exhibition path, always consistent with HZERO's original view of the railway world, albeit with an eye on the classics of model railroading.
The new railway exhibition is being set up
Regarding new exhibitions, HZERO continues its investigation into the universe of trains and travel with a new focus on model railroading, which comes to life this June in the spaces of the museum's first floor. The new railway exhibition features a selection of precious models from private collections, such as the Ruggini collection and the Fermodellistica Pratese Association, which provide an accurate narrative of the history of travel throughout the centuries, divided into two display cases: from the Orient Express train, famous for its numerous cultural references in the world of cinema and literature, as well as a means of transportation that accompanied tourists and businessmen from Paris to Istanbul from 1883 to the 1970s, to the private train equipped with all comforts specially built for King Ludwig II of Bavaria in 1876. The journey continues with the exhibition of the "Settebello" electric train with its interiors and designs by Gio Ponti and Giulio Minoletti between 1952 and 1959, and the more recent "Arlecchino," characterized by the unique and unmistakable pastel chromaticity of its carriages.
The new project dedicated to the history of trains is enriched with intersections with other transportation systems and ways of traveling. In the Florence train museum, the models of historic trams made of brass and entirely by hand by Francesco Conti and Adriano Betti Carboncini also find an ideal place. Among these, it is possible to admire the reproduction of Line 13, the first tramway that connected Florence to Peretola, inaugurated in 1879, and the Carro Tipo F, intended for food transport in the period between the two wars, handmade by modeler Mario Bucciero. As you can see, the new exhibition focus brings with it suggestions, stories, and worlds linked to the train to be discovered and explored.
Interactive Train Museum: A Journey for True Enthusiasts
To complement the new path into the world of model railroading, an interactive exhibition is planned, conceived to immerse oneself in the railway vocabulary in a creative and original way. The public is invited to actively interact with typical elements of present and past railway tradition, such as railway signals, the oil lamp once placed at the front of steam locomotives, the marmots, and the rotating red disk that gave the engineer the signal to leave the station and start the journey. It's a playful, sensory, and educational experience that conveys an even clearer and more suggestive idea of the elements that interact with the protagonists of the HZERO universe: trains.