Vassena, the sport of invention

At the Barca Lariana Museum, the extraordinary figure of Pietro Vassena, a self-taught inventor and visionary entrepreneur born in Malgrate in 1897. From an early age he showed a passion for machinery, engines and transportHe honed his curiosity in the lively industrial environment of the Lecco area. After serving in the Bersaglieri cyclists during the First World War, he worked as a turner at Faini: it was here that Vassena began to design, propose modifications and build; among other things, he made a automatic ray machine, a two-stroke auxiliary engine for bicyclesand develops outboard engines ELIOSthe first products in Italy in this category.

During the World War IIwith the problem of fuel shortages, invents devices such as theAutargas and the gasogenused for civil and military transport and even on railway engines. Moving below the surface of the lake, he worked for years on submarines: after a prototype and the Dolphin Snorkel, builds the bathyscaphe C3He set the world record for diving in Lake Como, at -412 metres. In the 1950s he devoted himself to some of the most innovative engines and motorbikes, to plastic for transparent watches anticipating trends, and even to boats such as the Skivassforerunners of the ultra-modern paddle surf.

This exhibition is a tale of genius, industriousness, intuition: not just inventionsbut imagination that was able to anticipate forms, uses and technologies; not only technology projectsbut an authentic creative spirit placed at the service of progress. The Museo Barca Lariana intends to pay tribute to Vassena as a figure who was as romantic as he was concrete, capable of going through wars, crises, innovations, always with his sights set on the future.