We’re D’Uva. Nice to meet you!
About D’Uva
The D’Uva team
Curious minds
We share a love of art and new technologies. We bring different skills to a common purpose: telling stories that move visitors and stay with them long after a visit.
Our story
We have been using technology to tell the stories of cultural heritage since 1959.
1959
Our beginnings in Milan Cathedral
In 1959 Giovanni Battista Montini, then Archbishop of Milan and later Pope Paul VI, welcomed Giovanni D’Uva’s multilingual audio guides into Milan Cathedral. That is where our story began.
1976
What about pictures?
We built our first video guide. A photoelectric cell synchronised twelve slides with the soundtrack. By then our audio guides could be heard in the cathedrals of Florence, Pisa and Siena and in churches across Rome.
1997
An audio tour at the Colosseum
Italy’s Ronchey Law opened up museum visitor services to private operators. We installed one of the first digital audio guides at the Colosseum and the Roman Forum.
2000
Audio guides in Pompeii
We won the first tender to run audio tours at Pompeii and Herculaneum. Over the years we expanded into ticketing, museum shops and education at cultural sites across Italy.
2011
Lilium goes digital
Our first video guide had a successor: Lilium Touch. A coin still set the audiovisual story in motion. The new station combined a touchscreen, digital content and a distinctive design.
2015
A new home in Florence
We moved into a light-filled loft in Florence. Here we brought design, technology and storytelling together to develop apps, websites, virtual tours and immersive experiences.
2019
We open San Giorgio Café in Venice
We were already welcoming visitors to the Giorgio Cini Foundation on the island of San Giorgio Maggiore. In 2019 we opened San Giorgio Café, the bistro we designed with Filippo La Mantia. Hospitality took on a new meaning for us. After visiting the cloisters or the chapels in the woods, visitors could sit down to a meal overlooking St Mark’s Basin.
2020
A Soundtrack Experience
During the pandemic we produced our first Soundtrack Experience. Antonio Fresa composed an original score for the Giorgio Cini Foundation’s audio tour of the Vatican Chapels. We released it with Adesiva Discografica and brought it to the concert stage with the Orchestra of Teatro La Fenice.
2021
We take on the Museum of the Treasure of San Gennaro in Naples
In October the Deputation entrusted us with the management of the Museum of the Treasure of San Gennaro. In Naples, the story of a jewel is also the story of its donor, the vow they made and the city’s bond with its patron saint. This shaped our work on visitor reception, audio guides and accessibility. In 2024 it also inspired the permanent video installation “Chi è devoto a San Gennaro?” in the Mitre Room.
2023–2024
At the Pantheon, an audio guide becomes a concert
Hadrian, Raphael and Queen Margherita of Savoy speak for themselves at the Pantheon. For the Chapter of the Basilica of Santa Maria ad Martyres, we produced a dramatised audio guide with an original score by Antonio Fresa. On 8 June 2024 the music was performed live beneath the dome, with Fresa at the piano and conducting the Orchestra of Teatro La Fenice.
2024
We take the helm at MUNAV in Venice
Difesa Servizi awarded us a twelve-year concession to manage and develop the Italian Navy’s Naval History Museum, the Ships Pavilion and the submarine Enrico Dandolo. Our work begins with the collections and takes us aboard the submarine itself. We design visitor routes, run reception and communications, and open the museum to the city through exhibitions and events.
2026
Introducing OhMyGuide, D’Uva’s tour operator
For years we have welcomed visitors at the entrance to a museum, a church or a monument. With OhMyGuide, we meet them earlier too, while they are still choosing where to go. In our shops in Milan and Rome and at ohmyguide.it we share what we have learned from working at cultural sites every day.
With OhMyGuide we create and run visits, audio tours and itineraries in Italy’s cities of art. In Rome, the voices of “Cuore di Roma” accompany visitors from the Pantheon to the Trevi Fountain. In Venice, they walk between the hedges of the Borges Labyrinth listening to music composed for that very place. Travellers can choose their route, book it and speak to someone who knows it. Since our first audio guide in Milan Cathedral, the starting point of a visit has changed too.
Who we work with
Our clients
Thanks to these institutions, millions of visitors see and hear our stories.
Our certifications
Certification is part of our management system. Independent assessments give our clients, suppliers, staff and partners assurance about the quality of our services and the way we work.
Quality management certification · ISO 9001
Gender equality certification · UNI/PdR 125:2022