A new museum focusing on the ancient Roman city of Pompeii is set to open in the Italian city of Naples.
The space is 103,000 square meters (1.1 million square feet) and will be designed by architect Paolo Desideri. It will be located inside the old Albergo dei Poveri, a building also known as Palazzo Fuga. This new institution will serve as a sister museum to the Museo Nazionale Archaeologico Napoli (MANN) and will therefore be known as MANN 2.
The building has been empty for decades and the new museum is part of a city-wide revitalization effort aimed at improving tourism. A large collection of artefacts that have otherwise remained in storage due to insufficient exhibition space will now be housed in the previously abandoned site.
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A section of the museum will focus on Pompeii, which was preserved in ashes after the eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79. The museum has more than 40,000 objects from the excavation of the ancient city.
The showcase will highlight the remains of the city and trace its discovery in the 18th century. There will also be a series of exhibitions in honor of archaeologists of historical reference such as Giuseppe Fiorelli, Vittorio Spinazzola or Amedeo Maiuri. In addition, there will be interactive rooms and areas dedicated to research.
“At Palazzo Fuga we don’t want to replicate a collection already well told in MANN itself: rather, we are going to create a space dedicated to the history of the rediscovery of the Vesuvius sites through artefacts, but also reconstructions, panels and multimedia supports”, said Massimo Osanna , director general of museums in Italy collector.
Parts of the MANN 2 building will also house a branch of the National Archaeological Museum of Naples and the city’s National Library; more than half of the building will function as classrooms of the University of Naples Federico II. A bookshop, a cafe and a panoramic terrace will also be part of the renovation.
Funded at 158 million euros ($170 million), the project is expected to be completed by mid-2026.
