AT A GLANCE
Why go?
The Civic Art Collections of Palazzo Marliani-Cicogna are Busto Arsizio's municipal art museum, housed in a stately former residence of the city's feudal lords. The gallery spans five centuries of art, from devotional frescoes rescued from rural shrines to a major Hayez portrait and contemporary works acquired through annual painting prizes.↗↗
The palace itself is part of the story. Its curved eighteenth-century façade and frescoed wooden ceilings frame a collection that grew from fifty works in 1990 to over 800 today through donations and municipal purchases, making this a compact but rich cross-section of Lombard painting.↗↗
The museum is currently closed for renovation from January 2026, with a reopening expected in 2027.↗↗
The Palace
Palazzo Marliani-Cicogna stands on Piazza Vittorio Emanuele II in the heart of Busto Arsizio. Its origins date to 1624, when Count Luigi Marliani—a member of the family that held feudal rights over the city—purchased a rural house facing a large piazza. Over the next three decades he transformed it into a proper noble residence, traces of which survive in a ground-floor room where part of the original courtyard paving is still visible.
