Mirella with one of her sculptures

  The Torpedo Factory Art Center was an actual torpedo factory that the U.S. Navy built to manufacture torpedo shell casings and other weapons following World War I  and throughout WW II.  In 1969, the City of Alexandria bought it and remained unused until 1974 when Marian Van Landingham, founder and the first director of the Torpedo Factory Art Center, proposed the use of the two smallest buildings as an art center. Today the Torpedo Factory is a thriving not for profit organization that serves as an example of how the arts can revitalize a community and as a prototype for communities throughout the world who wish to establish their own visual arts center.