The museum of Parmigiano Reggiano cheese, created inside the old dairy at the Corte Castellazzi in Soragna in the Province of Parma, is an ethnographic museum illustrating how this cheese is produced.
The museum has been created inside a nineteenth-century farmstead belonging to the Meli-Lupi castle in Soragna. The castle, with a circular plan, was built in 1848 by Casimiro Meli-Lupi. Expanded in 1963 with the construction of two new rooms to use as milking and salting rooms, it remained active until 1977.
The exhibition includes material collected from the Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese production area which includes five provinces: Parma, Reggio Emilia, Modena, Bologna to the west of the river Reno and Mantua to the south of the river Po.
The objects originate between the second half of the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century.
The exhibition project is based on the concept that the dairy is in itself already a museum, with places and equipment that illustrate the production of Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese.
It is arranged in sections in three rooms formed from those originally used for the dairy’s production, Room A in the circular building, Room B in the underground salting room and Room C in the overhead milking room. In addition there is a space for refreshments and a museum-shop.