Ferdinando Marinelli Artistic Foundry

The Ferdinando Marinelli Artistic Foundry (Fonderia Artistica Ferdinando Marinelli also known as FAFM) is one of the last remaining Florentine foundries, producing works in bronze utilizing the Renaissance technique of lost-wax. A large number of bronze sculptures produced in Florence over the last century come from this artistic foundry. One of the most famous and popular works in Florence, the 'La Fontana del Porcellino', was cast by the Marinelli Foundry in 1988 and replaced the antique in 1998.

History
The history of the Fonderia Artistica Ferdinando Marinelli began in 1905 with the opening of a small shop on Florence’s Via de’ Giudei (today’s Via Ramaglianti) by Ferdinando Marinelli. Born in Piegaro, in the Province of Perugia in 1887, he arrived as a teenager in Florence where he was apprenticed first to Cusmano Vignali’s foundry and subsequently to Gabellini’s, learning the techniques of both stirrup manufacturing as well as lost-wax casting. In 1915, he was employed by the Fonderia of Alessandro Biagiotti (Biagiotti’s nickname was ‘Brucino’). After World War I, Ferdinando took over the Gabellini foundry on Via del Romito (today’s Via Filippo Corridoni). During this period, the Marinelli Foundry produced several monuments which commemorate the fallen of World War I; those on Piazza Dalmatia in Florence and Poggio a Caiano, (both by Mario Moschi) as well as those at Barberino Val d’Elsa and Cerbaia, (works by Odo Franceschi). In 1925, the Foundry executed the monument to the painter Giovanni Fattori donated to the city of Livorno by Valmore Gemignani. Two years later, the Chamber of Commerce, Florence surveyed the artisan workshops in the Province and reported that: "The reputation of the Marinelli Foundry […] rests on the perfection of its casting, employing an acid-based varnish permitting the metal to be displayed without losing any of its glare, maintaining warm tonalities, those of natural bronze thereby creating works of art."



The most important castings
A selection of the most important works and monuments executed by the Ferdinando Marinelli Artistic Foundry.