Livorno’s Naval Academy is the training school for officers of the Italian Navy. It was inaugurated in Livorno on 6 November 1881 on the initiative of the then Minister of the Navy, Admiral Benedetto Brin, as a fusion of the Naval Schools of Genoa and Naples.

The site chosen for its construction was previously occupied by the Lazzaretto di San Jacopo, an isolation hospital where the crews of ships from the Near East were quarantined.

Plans for the complex were completed in 1878 by the Livorno architect, Angiolo Badaloni.In 1913, the adjoining area previously occupied by the Lazzaretto di San Leopoldo, built on the orders of Pietro Leopoldo in the second half of the XVIII century and used as a prison from 1862, was also incorporated into the Naval Academy.

During the Second World War, the Naval Academy was first transferred to Venice, and then to Brindisi where it remained until 1946. At the end of the war, work to renovate and extend the infrastructures was started and lasted about twenty years.

To mark its Centenary in 1981, the Naval Academy and City of Livorno Trophy sailing regatta was established, in which international crews participate.

The Amerigo Vespucci, the training ship for the navy’s officer cadets, was built in 1930 and launched on 22 February 1931. The beauty of the ship and the style and efficiency of its crews immediately made the Vespucci an inimitable ambassador for the Italian Navy in the numerous ports of the Mediterranean.