This catalogue contains a collection of descriptive sheets for the main varieties of marble found in the quarries situated in the apuan alps (tuscany) that are famous throughout the world. The sheets have been compiled taking into consideration current european standards for the characterisation of natural stone and the catalogue is therefore a valid tool for companies working in the stone industry as well as architects and designers using tuscan marble.
The apuan alps are located in the north of tuscany. The actual sites where the quarries are located are in carrara (in the four basins of colonnata, miseglia, torano and pescina-boccanaglia), massa, lunigiana, garfagnana and versilia.
In 2002 the industrial district of carrara was set up including the towns of carrara, massa, fivizzano, minucciano and montignoso in the province of massa-carrara and piazza al serchio, pietrasanta, seravezza, stazzema and vagli di sotto in the province of lucca where the main stone quarrying and processing work is carried out.
Marble has been quarried in the apuan alps since the pre-roman times.
There are approximately 130 active quarries today, 2/3 of which are concentrated in the carrara area, that produce approximately 1.200.000 tons/year in terms of commercial and shapeless blocks. Due to the extreme purity of most of apuan marble (CaCO3 > 98%), a large quantity of quarry processing off-cuts is used for the production of calcium carbonate.
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