Massa Carrara is a province in the Tuscany region of Italy. It is named after the two main towns in its territory: Carrara and Massa, its capital.

Carrara is world famous for its white marble. The 300 or so quarries near the town date to Roman times, making this the oldest industrial site in continous use in the world. In Carrara itself there are numerous showrooms and workshops where the marble is sawn into sheets or sculpted into statues and ornaments. Many of the workshops welcome visitors.

• Museo Civico del Marmo founded in 1982 by the Town Administration, is aimed to preserve all works of local marble culture.
• Its collection is divided into different sections: Roman Archaeology, Territory History, Marble Library, Industrial Archaeology, Plaster Casts, Modern Sculpture.
• The Museum structure offers also a Library rich of books about marble and local history, and recently has been equipped with a multimedia point where it is possible to watch films about its own collections. The cultural structure of the museum grows during the time, providing a preservation of tradition and a technological development of marble processing.
• The Malaspina Castle in Massa represents one of the most important complex in Tuscany and it can be considered an open air museum.
• The complex has been transformed during the centuries: from a keep, a high fortified tower of the XI century, it changed in Renaissance becoming a residence with new defensive. In the second half of XVII century its main function is military.
• The whole complex has been recently reopened to the public after many years of refurbishing.
• The Brunella Fortress stands in a strategic position on a hill over the town of Aulla, where the rivers Magra and Aulella meet.
• The date of construction is open to conjecture, as is the identity of the proprietors, despite the fact that the building corresponds to the architectural standards typical of the age of transition: the first hypothesis dates the building to the end of the 15th century and attributes the project to Jacopo Ambrogio Malaspina, who was lord of Aulla at that time, the second hypothesis claims the fortress was built by Giovanni dalle Bande Nere, who came to Aulla in the first quarter of the 16th century, and may have entrusted Antonio da Sangallo il Vecchio with the project. A third hypothesis identifies the consigner of the work as Adamo Centurione, a merchant from Genoa who became the owner of the estate of Aulla in 1543.
• The Parish Church of Saints Ippolito and Cassiano today appears completely renovated: in fact, it was dismounted and mounted in a tower shape with cut stones in the Romanesque style typical of Lunigiana.
• The parish church is located at the foot of the Monte Barca, not far from the castle and the old centre of Bagnone.
• This is a typical example of mountain parish church, that probably developed itself of previous ligurian and roman buildings. As we see from a document dated 1149, it had a wide jurisdiction which included many communities of Apennine and the Magra valley.
• Malaspina Castle – Massa The castle stand on the hill at the foot of the Apuan Alps. The site was presumably occupied in the Late Middle Age by the Marchesi of Massa, although the earliest written documentation relevant to the castle dates back to the 12th century.

In the 15th century Massa became the property of the Marchesi Malaspina di Fosdinovo, who transformed the castle into a residence with important architectural work that lasted until the 17th century and included also restructuring the defensive parts. The architectural complex, which at the end of the 19th century was finally transformed into a prison, remained such up to 1946, but today after a restoration, it consists of 3 distinct units: the sturdy walls, with their ramparts, walks and embrasures for the artillery, the residence and the keep.

Each of these elements shows signs of the various phases of constructions, development and modification.