“...the artistic heritage of a people is sacred, and history requires that all great things be kept where they were born, where they add to the pride of the people who created them." With this spirit and these ideals, Professor Glauco Lombardi (1881-1970) devoted his entire life and all his physical, intellectual and economic energy to the recovery, study and conservation of all that remained on the antique market or in private collections of the enormous artistic and documentary heritage of Parma under the Bourbons (1748-1802, 1847-1859) and Maria Luigia (1816-1847), largely scattered, during the tragic, complex period of Italian Unification, among the many residences of the Savoy family.

From 1915 to 1943 the original nucleus of the Lombardi Museum was housed in the ballroom and adjacent rooms of the Palazzo Ducale in Colorno, where they had been stored thanks to the stubborn tenacity of GlaucoLombardi during decades of disinterest. 1934 is a crucial year for the museum: it was the year that Lombardi finally managed to stipulate an agreement with count Giovanni Sanvitale to sell the Museum the precious objects that had belonged to Duchess Maria Luigia, acquired by the Sanvitale family through Albertina Montenuovo Sanvitale, the daughter of the duchess and grandmother of count Giovanni.

The second world war, the difficult post-war years and the extenuating bureaucratic difficulties went on until 1961 when the museum was reopened in new premises, this time at Palazzo di Riserva in Parma, with the name of Museo Glauco Lombardi that was even then configured as a Foundation, named after the munificent initiator of the rare and unusual collection, under the aegis of the City of Parma and Monte di Parma Foundation.

From 1997 to 1999 the museum underwent a complete, very difficult restoration, which became necessary after the acquisition of new buildings that, while changing little of the original order and criteria of display planned and desired by Glauco Lombardi, made it possible to provide the museum structure with more modern and effective systems of security and utilization.