Founded 1882 — Woodburn, NSW
Historic New Italy holds the record of an Italian-speaking farming community carved from Northern NSW scrub by shipwreck survivors — and the volunteers who still keep its ledgers, tools and stories in order.
Plate I — Introduction
Historic New Italy is an ACNC-registered charity, volunteer-run and member-supported from its first gate to its last cup of coffee. There is no paid front desk here — only people who inherited this ground, or fell in love with its story, choosing to keep it open, seven days a week, for whoever finds their way off the Pacific Highway.
What began in 1882 as a scrub settlement of Italian pioneer families is now a working complex of museum halls, a café, a gift shop, a glass studio, a relocated Expo pavilion and a Park of Peace — every object catalogued, every visit welcome, donation optional.
Coffee, cakes, breakfast and lunch served on site — a working kitchen inside a living museum.
Moka pots, olive oil cans and Italian homewares — the shop stock of a household that never quite stopped being Italian.
Hand-flameworked borosilicate glass by Ian O'Driscoll, "Flamework" — working this bench since 1984.
Relocated from the 1988 Brisbane World Expo — a replica David, painted murals, and Lismore's first cappuccino machine.
Eleven bays under solar canopy — named Charging Station of the Year, 2025, on the same ground as a 19th-century farm.
Capacity for around 400, BYO beverages — booked for weddings, wakes, working bees and Alpini gatherings alike.
