MuMAC – Museum of Coffee Machines in Milan

The most important professional coffee machine manufacturer in the world »Gruppo Cimbali« celebrates its centenary with an own museum.

Architects/Designers: Arkispazio and V12 Design
Location: Via Pablo Neruda 2, 20082 Binasco (Milan), Italy

The core of the new architecture is a building previously used as a warehouse, within which are located both the exposition area and a versatile open space suitable for events and exhibitions to the culture of coffee. Within 1,800 m², MuMAC narrates a story that spans across 100 years, recounting the history of these extra ordinary objects.

Both facades of the museum have been rendered with a delicate nonetheless technological technique: »LaCimbali red« slats of a composite material create a sinuous embrace that has been inspired by the flow of the aroma lifting off a coffee cup and at night a carefully designed illumination creates a strikingly backlit grid of light that evokes the energy living inside MuMAC.

The internal garden is limited by this coffee-colored wall that is marked by nine trees which divide it into 10 equal spaces: ten decades of the century that symbolize the life and the achievements of Cimbali Group. The museum area offers an exposition divided into six historical periods from the beginning of the 20th century to the present: The area called »The early years« is characterized by a suspended ceiling and posters from Art Deco period. The exhibition of »The age of rationalism« includes a severe fascist colonnade and strict grid of orthogonal lines identifies the layout of the marble display stands.

In the area dedicated to the culture of the 50s and 60s (»Invention of the lever«) the visitor can find a reconstruction of a bar and an entirely cantilevered structure that supports the machines of the period where thanks to cleverly positioned mirrors, visitors can enjoy both sides of these wonderful machines.

»Under the banners of design« is characterized by a collection of design masterpieces of the late '60s and '70s: great masters of design have penned coffee machines in these decades, therefore these machine are actual design icons.

»The new millennium« is where the display stands are coated in white resin and they smoothly emerge from the floor equally coated in white resin: this area portrays the most modern machines, those designed for an increasingly fast society. This room has a full height red volume, which is visible from any angle of the museum. Within this volume is visible an installation of the new LaCimbali M100 coffee machine designed by Valerio Cometti+V12 Design: a daring exploded view that allows to grasp the technological content and the level of complexity of such machine, becoming an invitation to reflect on the extraordinary journey that the coffee machine has made during these last hundred years.

Project data Head designers: Paolo Balzanelli, Valerio Cometti
Structural engineering: Francesco Terreni
MEP engineering: Antonio Bozino
Client: Gruppo Cimbali
Built surface: 1,800 m²
Opening: October 2012

Arkispazio
V12 Design
MuMAC