The Library-Museum of Travel and Travel Literature is located in the Regional Park of Campo dei Fiori in Masciago Primo, Varese, currently occupies 50 square meters and is managed by the FreeZone Cultural Association.

In a world increasingly marked by the presence of speed, by the illusion of the reduction of the physical distance between one place and another on the planet, we deemed it necessary to rethink Travel as a total experience, absolutely to be valued in its material aspects, let's say experiential and in the more literary ones.

This is why we considered the creation of a Library / Museum as an important choice capable of conveying the vast heritage of Travel Literature in a single space, from its origins to today (with Italian and foreign works of all nationalities interested in this literary genre), and in all the different facets, themes and sub-genres, up to the latest updates.

We have also provided, inside, an Archive of the 20th Century which includes rare texts published between the end of the 19th century and the 50's of the 20th century. The integration, therefore, of library and museum, of literary texts and objects that evoke travel, represents the real novelty and also the uniqueness of this project. Material culture (the subject of many contemporary museum spaces), is combined with the literary culture of a genre, that of travel, which has experienced a great editorial development in recent years and an equally important media exposure both in Italy and abroad. .

Structure of the Library / Museum

The B / M of Travel and Travel Literature is made up of two distinct sections:

1) General Corpus of Travel Literature in volume;

2) Corpus of material objects related to the experience of traveling.

The first section is in turn divided into several sections:

1. Literary Texts Section

Historical Archive of Travel Literature Series, Works, Essays, Anthologies, Monographic Notebooks, Specialized Magazines.

a. Antiques section (19th century texts)

b. Modern antiques section (texts from 1900 to 1959)

c. Modern and contemporary section

1. Italian authors 2. Foreign authors 3. Grand Tour: Travels in Italy 4. Female Travelers 5. Walking tours: The Camino de Santiago and other journeys

2. Visual Section

Illustrated texts, Photographic works of travelers / writers, Travel book

3. Multimedia section

Cinematographic works (documentary films) relating to the theme of travel and ethnography

4. Specialized Magazines Section

Historical Travel Magazines

* The first section currently consists of a collection of 2300 volumes, mainly in Italian, but also with the presence of volumes in French, English and Spanish.

The second section, which we define as material culture, includes a series of objects that lead back to the idea of ​​travel, both in the geographical sense (tin, plastic and magnetic globes, atlases, geographical encyclopedias, city maps), and didactic (album of stickers of geography of Italy, Europe and the World), and in that directly linked to the practical experience of travel (geographical and road maps, old travel trunks, travel postcards in colors and b / w, souvenir accordions of cities, tourist guides, baedekers, original handwritten notebooks of travelers).