Museo della Carta di Toscolano Maderno

The paper museum is a multi-purpose centre dedicated to the world of paper production: machinery, production processes, papers, but also the history of local settlements and lifestyles. The project got off the ground with the first core - Men, machines, landscapes - founded in September 2002 thanks to the dynamism of the Municipal administration of Toscolano Maderno and enthusiasm of the Toscolano Paper mill Pensioners Group. The company's precise aim was to relaunch an important cultural heritage.

After starting from the Maina Inferiore plant's little porters lodge, the museum was then expanded, thanks to funds from the Lombardy Regional Authority, by incorporating the adjacent old production building. This means that a series of activities connected with the world of paper can now be hosted, among which a small production centre that shows past methods used in the valley and workshops where binding and restoration of old books take place.

Visitors can discover where the rags were accumulated in large tubs of maceration and left to overburden in water and lime for several days; subsequently they were passed into hydraulically operated hammers which reduced them to a thin pulp, called "pisto", with which the paper was actually made.

This was placed inside a large circular wooden container with a base of stone, called "tina", inside which the master cardio dipped a loom, the sieve, which collected the fine pulp and gave it the desired shape corresponding to the future sheet of paper.

From the frame the sheet was placed on felt cloths to form a pile that was placed under a press to be pressed and deprived of abundant excess water.

Then the sheets were hung in a well-ventilated room, a drying rack called "tendador", and left to dry.

Smoothing was carried out using stones or special wooden tools that smoothed the surface.