In Bologna Nervi attended the engineering school and graduated in civil engineering in 1913. He then worked in the technical department of the Concrete Structures Company in Bologna and Florence. In 1920 he went into business for himself and founded his own company, “Società Ing. Nervi e Nebbiosi”. His first international attention came in 1931 with the construction of the 35,000-seat municipal stadium in Florence. For this, he chose an inexpensive, visible concrete structure with widely cantilevered spiral staircases.
A year after the end of World War II, he was appointed to the chair of structural engineering and materials science at the University of Rome’s Faculty of Architecture. During this period he also invented ferrocement. This is a composite material made of cement mortar with a high degree of reinforcement based on wire mesh, used for thin-walled sheet structures such as those used in the construction of boats. From 1948 to 1949, he designed and constructed an exhibition hall in Turin.