It’s easy to think of a well-funded factory full of the best automotive talent like Ferrari making a race car. But it’s certainly more compelling—romantic even—to think of a family artfully transforming little Fiats into pocket rockets by hand.
This is why you visit the Stranguellini Museum in Modena. It’s the art with which cars were made.
You may be startled to learn that “Stanguellini is certainly the oldest Modenese name to be active in the car field since 1900.”
And you’ve never heard of them, right?
Let’s take a look at what you’ll see if you make a reservation to visit this free Museum.
The cars in front of the divider where the cars the Stranguellini raced. Behind them are the cars they’ve used and acquired over time, like the Alfa below.
There are over thirty race cars in the collection. But that’s not all. There are the tools and machines that made the parts, an ingot that would be turned into a crankshaft and then polished like a jewel:
You’ll learn that family had many racing victories in very small engined cars. Stanguellini race cars were always minimal. A worker who could take a kilo of weight out of a car without consequence was paid something like 20,000 lira.
A mid-mounted Moto Guzzi engine was stuffed inside an air-slick body and called the Colibrì. The 248 cc, 1 cylinder engine propelled the car to land speed records for the classification at Monza.
The work is extraordinary.
Visiting the Stranguellini Museum
You can pay 17 euro to see the Ferrari museum in Maranello, but the Stranguellini is easy to visit and it’s free when you make an appointment. If you like to see fast cars with small motors made by hand, this is the place you’ll want to visit.
Stranguellini Automobili
Via Emilia Est, 756 – 41100 Modena (Italy)
Tel: +39 059 361105
(Contact Page)