Until the middle of the i6th century there predominated home made furnaces for melting iron also in the area around Jesenice. In the first half of the 16th century a group of forge owners migrated here froth Lombardy who introduced a more effective Brescia smelting furnace and steel as made in Brescia, which was of higher quality. The family Bucellini were the owners of steel works on the Sava river for about 130 years, or rather until 1766, when, the smelting furnace and iron works were bought by the Ruard family. This family expanded the plants and bought new works in the surrounding area. The Ruard family joined the “Kranjska industrijska družba d. d.” (Krainische Industrie-Gesellschaft, The Industrial Association of Carniola).