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PRESIDENT NAPOLITANO OPENS “SHIPYARD 100” CENTENARY EXHIBITION OF MONFALCONE SHIPYARD
27 mar 2008
27 mar 2008
Today Italy’s President, Giorgio Napolitano, officially opened “Shipyard 100”, the exhibition organised by Fincantieri to celebrate the centenary of the foundation of Monfalcone shipyard (3rd April 1908), the largest of the eight yards in the Group. Nora Cosulich, granddaughter of Callisto Cosulich, one of the two brothers who founded the shipyard a century ago, was godmother to the ceremony which was very similar to a launch.
After the ceremony the President visited the shipyard’s production areas and the “Ventura”, a cruise ship of 114,000 gross tonnes which on Saturday will be presented to her owner, P&O Cruises.
Occupying an area of 1,600 square metres within the shipyard, the exhibition, which will be open to the public from 3 April to 30 June, describes the main events since 1908 up to yard’s position of excellence today. Along the exhibition’s pathway visitors can admire models, photographs, memorabilia and clips from the film archives of the RAI colleciton.
The multimedia exhibition comprises four sections. The first, (1908-1918), describes the origins of the shipyard, from its foundation by the Cosulich brothers to the annexation of the region Venezia Giulia to the Kingdom of Italy at the end of the First World War. The second, (1919-1945), deals with events between the two wars, a phase during which the yard expanded considerably and built some of the transatlantic liners which went on to make up the history of seafaring. The third, (1945-1990), covers the years from the end of WW2 up to the delivery, in 1990, of the first cruise ship. The last section, (1990-2008), is devoted to the leadership Fincantieri has gained in the cruise shipbuilding sector and the 24 ships built at Monfalcone shipyard. The exhibition closes with Monfalcone shipyard today: the “Ventura”.
Several of the items on display are highly important, as the altarpiece by Ugo Carà which decorated one of the salons of the motorship “Giulio Cesare” (the first Italian transatlantic liner after WW2, delivered in 1951) or the scale model of the seaplane “Cant”. The exhibition also includes reconstructions of the interiors of ocean lliners and a motorboat, the “Bora”, built by the yard in the 1960s and now fully restored.
Visitors to the exhibition are also invited on a tour of the shipyard’s main production areas – the workshop, dock and wharf – which shows the technical-industrial process behind the construction of a cruise ship nowadays.
Following the delivery of the “Ventura”, Monfalcone shipyard will go on to build, over the next three years, 5 of the 20 cruise ships (including 2 options) now in the orderbook of Fincantieri, world leader in cruise shipbuilding.
Monfalcone, 27 March 2008
After the ceremony the President visited the shipyard’s production areas and the “Ventura”, a cruise ship of 114,000 gross tonnes which on Saturday will be presented to her owner, P&O Cruises.
Occupying an area of 1,600 square metres within the shipyard, the exhibition, which will be open to the public from 3 April to 30 June, describes the main events since 1908 up to yard’s position of excellence today. Along the exhibition’s pathway visitors can admire models, photographs, memorabilia and clips from the film archives of the RAI colleciton.
The multimedia exhibition comprises four sections. The first, (1908-1918), describes the origins of the shipyard, from its foundation by the Cosulich brothers to the annexation of the region Venezia Giulia to the Kingdom of Italy at the end of the First World War. The second, (1919-1945), deals with events between the two wars, a phase during which the yard expanded considerably and built some of the transatlantic liners which went on to make up the history of seafaring. The third, (1945-1990), covers the years from the end of WW2 up to the delivery, in 1990, of the first cruise ship. The last section, (1990-2008), is devoted to the leadership Fincantieri has gained in the cruise shipbuilding sector and the 24 ships built at Monfalcone shipyard. The exhibition closes with Monfalcone shipyard today: the “Ventura”.
Several of the items on display are highly important, as the altarpiece by Ugo Carà which decorated one of the salons of the motorship “Giulio Cesare” (the first Italian transatlantic liner after WW2, delivered in 1951) or the scale model of the seaplane “Cant”. The exhibition also includes reconstructions of the interiors of ocean lliners and a motorboat, the “Bora”, built by the yard in the 1960s and now fully restored.
Visitors to the exhibition are also invited on a tour of the shipyard’s main production areas – the workshop, dock and wharf – which shows the technical-industrial process behind the construction of a cruise ship nowadays.
Following the delivery of the “Ventura”, Monfalcone shipyard will go on to build, over the next three years, 5 of the 20 cruise ships (including 2 options) now in the orderbook of Fincantieri, world leader in cruise shipbuilding.
Monfalcone, 27 March 2008