Museo delle Grigne, Ethnographic museum in Esino Lario, Italy.
The Museo delle Grigne is a museum in Esino Lario housed within two buildings of Villa Clotilde, displaying fossils, minerals, and regional artifacts collected from the surrounding area. The exhibition spaces feature rock specimens, animal remains, and handmade objects that document life in this mountainous region.
The Museo delle Grigne was inaugurated on 28 July 1935 by the priest Giovanni Battista Rocca, making it the first local museum in the Province of Como. Around 1936 he gathered Gallic and Roman tomb finds unearthed during building work at the edge of the village. The collection was looted during World War II, but the archaeological finds survived because they were deposited at the Museo di Varese. In 1959 the municipality, led by mayor Pietro Pensa, officially re-established the museum in new rooms on Piazza del Comune.
The exhibition shows traditional mountain life through tools, clothing, and everyday objects that reveal how local people worked and lived in the hills. Visitors can see the crafts and skills that were essential to surviving in these steep valleys.
The museum is spread over three sites: the historic seat on Piazza Pietro Pensa, the new seat in the garden of Villa Clotilde at via Montefiori 19, and a space on Villa Clotilde's first floor. The butterfly and beetle collections moved to that upper floor in 2012. Opening and guided visits are handled by volunteers of the Associazione Amici del Museo delle Grigne.
The butterfly collection donated by Paolo Boncompagni holds 11 display cases of Italian butterflies; Elisabetta Redigolo gave the beetle collection. In 2012 both were moved to the first floor of Villa Clotilde and made part of Roberto Paci Dalò's sound installation Animagus. The historic seat in Piazza Pietro Pensa keeps a casel, a reconstruction of the mountain hut used on the maggenghi around Esino Lario.
The community of curious travelers
AroundUs brings together thousands of curated places, local tips, and hidden gems, enriched daily by 93,224 contributors worldwide.
