Ivrea’s Olivetti district is the most complete surviving record of a 20th-century industrialist’s attempt to build a humane factory town. Canteens, a library, a nursery and glass-walled workshops still stand as Adriano Olivetti left them, inscribed by UNESCO in 2018 as an urban planning achievement rather than a conventional monument.
At a glance
Ivrea, in the province of Turin, grew around the typewriter and computer manufacturer C. Olivetti & C., founded there in 1908 by Camillo Olivetti. His son Adriano Olivetti took over the company in 1932 and turned it into far more than a factory, commissioning architects to build workers’ housing, a canteen, a nursery, a library and social services alongside the production halls. In 2018 UNESCO inscribed 23 individual buildings and complexes across the city under the title Ivrea, Città Industriale del XX Secolo, reference 1538.
Key facts
- Founded: C. Olivetti & C. established in Ivrea in 1908 by Camillo Olivetti
- Key architects: Luigi Figini and Gino Pollini designed the main factory and social services centre; Ignazio Gardella designed the workers’ canteen; Marco Zanuso worked on later residential buildings and also designed Olivetti machines
- UNESCO status: inscribed in 2018 as Ivrea, Città Industriale del XX Secolo, reference 1538, covering 23 buildings and complexes
- Coordinates: 45.4671° N, 7.8739° E
- Comparison: often set against Crespi d’Adda, a paternalist-hierarchical company town some 40 km south inscribed by UNESCO in 1995; Ivrea’s model was explicitly egalitarian, with shared canteens and childcare regardless of an employee’s rank
History
Camillo Olivetti, an engineer who had trained in the United States, founded his typewriter company in Ivrea in 1908, producing Italy’s first domestically made typewriter, the M1. The business expanded through the 1920s and 1930s into calculating machines and export markets including Britain, France and Brazil.
Adriano Olivetti, who took control in 1932, reshaped the company into a cultural project. In 1940 Figini and Pollini completed Fabbrica 1, whose steel-and-glass curtain wall introduced International Style industrial architecture to Italy, replacing the masonry factories typical of the period. Through the 1940s and 1950s the campus grew to include the Centro Servizi Sociali, the Quartiere Castellamonte housing and the Mensa Olivetti canteen designed by Gardella.
Adriano died in 1960, and with him the momentum of the architectural and social programme; later management focused on manufacturing efficiency rather than expanding the community model. Ivrea nonetheless kept producing landmark machines, including the Elea 9003, the first Italian fully transistorised computer, styled by Ettore Sottsass, and later the Programma 101, developed in Ivrea by Pier Giorgio Perotto. The city’s planning achievement was formally recognised in 2018 with UNESCO inscription, reference 1538.
What you see
The inscribed area brings together the industrial and social buildings that made up Adriano Olivetti’s project. Fabbrica 1 shows its original glass curtain wall lighting the factory floors. The Centro Servizi Sociali, by Figini and Pollini, held the canteen, nursery, library, health clinic and cinema under one roof. Gardella’s Mensa Olivetti stands out for its thin precast concrete roof carried on slender steel columns. The Libreria Olivetti bookshop, designed by Elio Ardissone with furniture by Zanuso, remains open on Via Jervis. The Quartiere Castellamonte housing, built around shared green courtyards, shows the residential side of the scheme.
Practical information
- Visiting the interiors: a guided tour is recommended to access the buildings, as many remain in company or private use
- The Libreria Olivetti: still functions as a bookshop on Via Jervis
- Villa Olivetti: Adriano’s private residence overlooking the town is not part of the UNESCO inscription and is not open to the public
- Current opening arrangements: check the official Ivrea UNESCO or municipal tourism channels before visiting, as access to individual buildings can vary
Getting there
Ivrea lies in the province of Turin, Piemonte, on the Dora Baltea river below the Alps. The inscribed buildings are spread through the town, making a walk between them the practical way to see the site.
Nearby
- Crespi d’Adda — around 40 km south, a UNESCO-inscribed company town of 1995 built on a more hierarchical, paternalist model than Ivrea
- Dora Baltea river and the Canavese plain — the landscape setting Adriano Olivetti insisted the factory should sit within, without walls or fencing separating it from the surroundings
Sources
- UNESCO World Heritage inscription, reference 1538
- Adriano Olivetti, Società, stato, comunità (1952)
- Adriano Olivetti, Il cammino della speranza (1958)
- Lewis Mumford, The Culture of Cities (1938)
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