I was lucky enough to be able to attend a conference in Turin last October, and afterwards my wife Jane and I enjoyed a week or so of sightseeing. While Turin is not the center of the world as far as Alfa is concerned, it is indeed a very pleasant and interesting city. We were there for four days and could do without a car, as the city is relatively compact. I did inquire whether there were factory tours available at FIAT, but our host at the Politecnico di Torino said there was no chance. So, automotively, we made do by visiting the museum of modern art that was showing (amongst other things) a fine selection of FIAT advertisements from 1910 to 1960 expansively promoting the brand – a good example being the FIAT L’Arco di Trionfo, complete with centurions atop.

Then onto the Museo dell’Automobile in Turin just south of the city and near the old FIAT Lincotta factory that has recently been converted into a magnificent conference center. The museum has a wide range of cars and, as you might expect, the emphasis is on Italian makes. There were relatively few Alfas in the general exhibition area, but those I saw I did photograph. There were some unusual pieces, including the original Bertone Giulietta Sprint body mock-up and an American-bodied 1926 RL supersport. Unfortunately, the competition displays on the top floor were not open due to "reconstruction", but presumably Alfa is well represented up there. There is a separate Ferrari exhibition area as well, but this was also closed – why, we weren’t told. The cars were generally in fairly good, one might say authentic, shape but certainly not up to "concours" standard by and large – good patina, though! Overall, the museum is worth a visit if you’re in Turin, but it might be a bit of a disappointment to an Alfa enthusiast. We spent about two hours there. There were no catalogs of the collection that I could see in the museum bookstore.

We rented a VW at the Turin railway station and drove up to Como, just north of Milan, for a few days of sightseeing. From Como, we took a one-day trip to Milan, during which Jane was kind enough to point out an automotive bookstore after we had visited the cathedral, so I was all set for a while. The Libreria dell’Automobile (www.libreriadellautomobile.it) at Corso Venezia, 43 is a very well-stocked bookstore and one can clearly spend hours there. It is an easy walk from the center of Milan and less than a mile from the cathedral. All of the normal selections of a comprehensive auto bookstore are there plus a section that has rare books for perusal. Alfas were fairly well represented but again, as in the museum, the attention wasn’t overwhelming by any means. Ferrari, on the other hand, was well covered to say the least. A large proportion of the books were in English and readily available over here. The prices for the books I am familiar with were definitely higher than here, as you might expect, but if it’s an Italian publication you seek, then this must be the place. The store is actually owned by a publishing house in Milan, Giorgio Nada Editore, whose comprehensive web site www.giorgionadaeditore.com is well worth a visit. They put out a periodical in newspaper format twice a year – the one I picked up features the Giulietta Spider and is full of information dealing with their design, history, and restoration.

I also came across what appears to be a fairly definitive reference book entitled "All the Alfa Romeos 1910 – 2000". It is published by Editoriale Domus in Italy in 2000, available in English or Italian. Luckily the English version on the shelf had not been browsed, so I was able to buy a pristine copy. The book covers not only production cars but also exhibition prototypes. A section on competition vehicles includes all the Grand Prix cars as well as their production derivatives. The book has over 600 pages and is well worth the approximately $60 it costs. It is a small format presentation (6" x 9") and comes in a protective box. Each car is given a descriptive page and a photo page opposite, except for some special cars that have an extra page or two. It seems to be at the least a very useful introduction to every car Alfa made, although certainly other books will offer more depth of selected vehicles, I imagine.