The annual Museimpresa seminar took place in Biella from October 14 to 16. This year’s event celebrated the 25th anniversary of the association, which brings together the national network of Italian corporate museums and archives. The Fondazione MAIRE – ETS took part in the event alongside representatives from the worlds of culture, institutions, and business to reflect on the role of memory and knowledge in shaping the future.

Founded in 2001, Museimpresa now brings together a national network of corporate museums and archives with the goal of preserving, promoting, and making Italy’s industrial heritage accessible. In 2026, the Association will celebrate its first 25 years of activity: a milestone that has provided an opportunity to reflect on the value of corporate memory and its ability to generate knowledge, education, and innovation through dialogue among different organizations, regions, and generations.

At the heart of the 2026 edition is the theme of words as tools for preserving and transmitting corporate cultural heritage. During the seminar, the book “Il vocabolario della cultura d’impresa” (The Vocabulary of Corporate Culture) was presented. Produced in collaboration with Scuola Holden and published by Marsilio Arte, it brings together 129 words chosen by members to illustrate the value of Italian know-how through stories, skills, technologies, and visions. This collaborative project brings together diverse experiences and reaffirms the link between knowledge and the transmission of learning, transforming words into a tool capable of preserving memory and generating new perspectives for the future. The Foundation has championed the word “ingegno” (ingenuity) understood as the ability to interpret the complexity of reality and transform it into possibility. For us, this principle means helping people understand the avant-garde and contemporary nature of the past, with the awareness that time is a dimension we must inhabit and engage with critically. It is a thread that links engineering, science, art, and philosophy and runs through our corporate history; it is no coincidence that the Foundation’s mission is “to train the humanist engineers of tomorrow”.

The chosen word, paired with three images—representing a word, a challenge, and a perspective—guided the discussion among members on the daily challenges involved in managing and promoting corporate heritage. Representing the Fondazione MAIRE – ETS was our Heritage Manager, Francesca Rinaldo. A technical drawing, a visual expression of the engineers’ design capabilities and, at the same time, of the complexity inherent in preserving and passing on intangible heritage such as expertise; the management of the Group’s archival heritage, a constantly growing collection, carried out through parallel activities of documentation, cataloging, preservation, digitization, and promotion—representing the daily challenges and commitments. The third image was generated using AI, looking toward the future: we envisioned a headquarters where all the archival heritage of the MAIRE Group companies could be brought together; a place open to scholars, researchers, students, and colleagues—a place where documents, tools, drawings, and materials are not merely preserved but become a living heritage. A place capable of generating knowledge, enriching the local community, and creating opportunities for interaction and learning.

The annual Museimpresa seminar once again proved to be a hub for enrichment and exchange; three days of meetings, tours, and discussions dedicated to the value of corporate culture and the transfer of knowledge—a collective narrative that reaffirmed Biella’s role as a place where industrial culture, the local area, and the community continue to engage in dialogue and generate shared value.