The collection is displayed in the Baroque palace, formerly belonging to the Mansi family, and located in central Lucca.

[1] The Palace was first erected at the site of a few earlier tower-houses bought in 1616 by the Lucchese merchant of silk Ascanio Mansi and his descendants.

While the facade retains earlier Renaissance window features, between 1686 and 1691, Ascanio's son Raffaello employed the architect Raffaello Mazzanti to further renovate the now palace, and the piano nobile rooms acquired the present decoration and a grand staircase access.

In the mid-1960s his children sold the palace to the state, which has converted into a National Museum of arts and tapestries.

The interiors house a highly decorated bedroom alcove with gilded caryatid columns flanking the portal.