Fundición Lambert, Industrial heritage site in La Serena, Chile.

Fundición Lambert consists of remaining structures from a 19th-century copper processing facility positioned near La Serena's city center. The preserved buildings show the installations where ore was melted, processed, and refined into copper products.

Charles Lambert founded this copper foundry in 1840 and introduced reverberatory furnaces that transformed Chilean mining. The facility was among the first of its kind in South America and drove modernization of the regional industry.

The site is also called "El Escorial", after the slag heaps that gave the sector its name. The foundry forms an architectural ensemble with the Lambert family mansion and park, today an old people's home, and the cenotaph of Charles Lambert, who died in Hawaii. During the 1851 siege of La Serena the works were occupied by Argentine mercenaries from Copiapó, and a battle was fought there.

The site is walkable from La Serena's downtown and offers insight into early industrial operations. Visitors should check ahead as accessibility may vary depending on ongoing restoration work.

The first copper plates rolled here were made into the first warships built entirely in Chile, and the earliest sheets were sent to the national museum. The foundry also ran Chile's first sulfuric acid plant and its first metal-crushing machine.