Palazzo Belgiojoso dates back to the early 18th century and was built by the Locatelli family, originally from the Imagna Valley of Bergamo. It has the typical appearance of an eighteenth-century palace, with a large internal colonnaded portico and facades scanned by moldings to decorate the large windows.

In 1794 the building was sold to Giovanna Mellerio, wife of Prince Carlo Rinaldo di Belgiojoso d'Este, who died in 1797, shortly after the seizure of the building by the authorities of the Cisalpine Republic, who wanted to transform it into the seat of the Mountain Department.

After having experienced many changes of ownership during the nineteenth century and having been used for various uses, in 1927 Palazzo Belgiojoso became the seat of the Civic Museums of Lecco.

It is home to the Natural History Museum which was the first museum in Lecco, created by Carlo Vercelloni in 1888 with his private collection of taxidermized animals. To this are added the Archaeological Museum , built in 2000 and the Civic Planetarium , inaugurated in 2004. On the ground floor there is the recent Historical Museum , which covers the history of the city from the Risorgimento to the Second World War with a focus on the Resistance and a room Virtual dedicated to the history of the iron industry, peculiarities and excellence of the territory starting from the seventeenth century.

Starting from September 2021 in the three museums of Palazzo Belgiojoso it is possible to take advantage of the permanent routes Please touch me! With eyes closed in the museum. These are multisensory and multimedia workstations designed for the visually impaired and blind: voice captions, tactile cards, faithful reproductions of finds, digital devices. Today everyone can approach the artistic heritage of these museums in new ways, able to involve also on an emotional level.