He served as the first Italian Ambassador of the then recently unified Italy to the United States from 1881 to 1893.

Prior to his service for Italy in the United States of America, Baron Fava served in Brazil and Romania.

Lodging a protest with Secretary of State James Blaine and eventually negotiating directly with President Benjamin Harrison, the Baron requested federal action to address a lynching of the eleven Italian citizens being managed as a State of Louisiana criminal event.

His return a year later to the US was celebrated as a demonstration of Italian-US relations being restored to "full harmony" [5] Despite resolution of the New Orleans affair, the Ambassador again faced similar circumstances later in his career with the lynching of Italian citizens at Tallulah, LA with strong protests to then Secretary of State John Hay and President William McKinley.

[7] Grand Officer of Saints Maurice and Lazarus Commander of the Order of the Crown of Italy