pALLADIO AND LA VILLEGGIATURA
Villa Barbaro, Maser - designed by Palladio in 1558
Hello everyone!
Come state? How are you? All quiet here, and the proof that I am finally becoming British is that I am delighted with the cooler weather of these last two weeks; I just wish there was just a little more sunshine...
La mia villeggiatura, my holidays, are receding into the past, but if you want to see photos from our stay in the Dolomites please go to my Instagram account. Some of you complimented my dad’s appearance at the ripe old age of 90 and a half (!) and asked me what diet he follows! The answer is that my old man eats everything but in small quantities and drinks un dito di vino, a finger of wine (put your finger horizontally against the glass and you get the measure) at each meal. That is very little wine. Mind you, he did have a quadruple bypass 17 years ago but all has been well since. Of course he rattles with pills of every kind (thyroid, blood pressure etc...)
Dad, Tesero, August 2020
La Villeggiatura
Did you know that villeggiatura, holidays, comes from villeggiare, going to your villa in the countryside, which is what noble Venetians used to do in the summer. When I was a child the word was still very much used, whilst nowadays the word ‘vacanze’ is predominant in Italian. Villeggiatura gives you a hint of how the custom of going on holiday started. Wealthy Venetians who owned land with a villa would go on holiday there - working class people neither had a villa, nor went a holiday.
Villa La Capra, or La Rotonda, Vicenza, designed by Palladio in 1567
A brief history of Venetian Holidays
The exact starting point of the custom of villeggiatura was 17th June 1345 when the Republic of Venice revoked the law by which Venetians were not allowed to own land. The republic had made considerable conquests inland and it was necessary that its wealthy citizens would buy land from the state and set up farms. Venice needed lots of grain for its self-sufficiency and no longer wanted to import much from its enemy, the Ottoman Empire.
The wealthy Venetian embraced with gusto the possibility of owning land and a house in the countryside, given the fact that their living quarters in Venice were quite restricted and had no gardens. Owning a villa in the country became a must and fulfilled their needs and desires.
The villas in the Veneto were not designed just to be beautiful homes and show off the owner’s social status, but they had a practical function and next to them were farm buildings and barns. This way land owners could live for part of year on their land and manage their property, particularly during the harvest period. The purpose of some villas was also that of a hunting lodge.
Villa Emo Capodilista, Euganean Hills, designed as a hunting lodge by Dario Varotari in 1567. This villa can only be visited by appointment
Villas in the Past and Present
The Veneto and Friuli together boast 3,804 villas and 3,529 of them are in a good or excellent state. Out of all these villas only 207 can be visited by the public, which is still a large number. Most villas have certain features in common. On the ground floor were the kitchen and the servants’ quarters. On the first floor, which was called piano nobile, i.e. noble floor, were the salon to entertain guests and generally the living and sleeping area of the owners. The loft area was used to store grain and other precious produce. Next to the villa there are one or two barchesse, which are grand farm buildings akin to barns where agricultural tools and animals were kept. Nearby there are smaller houses where the land workers lived.
The period of the villeggiatura went traditionally from 24th June, the day of San Giovanni, when villages would celebrate the saint with processions, up to September, and after the vendemmia, the grape harvest.
Palladio’s beginnings
The most famous of all Veneto villas are those designed by Andrea Palladio, the great architect who influenced architecture worldwide. Inigo Jones, Lord Burlington and William Kent were influenced too and many British country houses, not to mention Buckingham Palace are modelled on Palladian designs. The White House in Washington follows the same style.
In the Veneto nowadays you can visit 24 Palladian villas and 23 Palladian buildings in Vicenza.
Palladio was definitely a genius but geniuses need a little help or inspiration too. So, where did Palladio get his inspiration from?
Palladio’s real name was Andrea della Gondola, but bizarrely he was neither a gondolier nor came from Venice. In fact he was born in Padua and his father, Pietro della Gondola, was a miller. Andrea started his working life as a humble apprentice in a stonemason workshop but his boss was a mean man who made his workers’ life extremely hard. So Palladio ran away from his hated job and from Padua but eventually he returned and went to work for someone else. To cut a long story short, by the age of 30 he was a self-employed stonemason and bricklayer.
Palladio’s big break came when he was employed by the scholar Gian Giorgio Trissino who loved symmetry and harmonious proportions in buildings. Trissino found in young Andrea della Gondola a kindred spirit and involved him in his plans of re-designing his villa, Villa Trissino. Gian Giorgio clearly spotted real talent in young Andrea and became his patron and guru. He took him also to Rome with him on a visit and it was him who gave Andrea the nickname Palladio, which means ‘wise man’, from Pallas Athena, the Greek goddess of wisdom. By 1530 Palladio was not just recognised as a wise young stonemason but he was given the official title of architect.
Loggia and Odeo Cornaro, Padua, designed by Giovanni Falconetto in 1525
What inspired Palladio
No doubt the Roman trip made a grand impression on Palladio and the classical Roman buildings that he saw were of fundamental inspiration for his budding neo-classical taste. However, we can safely say that at the time of Palladio’s transformation from humble stonemason to architect he witnessed the erection of three buildings in his birth city of Padua and these are very likely to have influenced him.
The first two are the Loggia and Odeo Cornaro in Padua, and the third is Villa dei Vescovi on the Euganean Hills near Padua. All three buildings were designed by the architect Giovanni Maria Falconetto (1468 – 1535) for Alvise Corner, a Venetian nobleman. What is significant is that they were all trail-blazers for Renaissance architecture and they all boast features that recall classical Roman and Greek architecture.
Villa dei Vescovi, Euganean Hills, designed by Giovanni Falconetto in 1540
Villa dei Vescovi means Bishops’ Villa and it was the first ever villa built in a country setting. It is a stunning building with loggias, terraces, symmetry and proportions which all contribute to its elegance and gracefulness. The villa, like many other villas, is surrounded by vineyards and is a true gem. Falconetto was clearly also a genius and the first architect to design a villa taking into consideration its natural setting.
If you are interested in visiting Villa dei Vescovi with me and a few other beautiful villas, some Palladian and some not, please have a look my website – next year I will visit different villas on different tours.
The photo here below is of Villa Pisani, in Stra'. It isn't a Palladian Villa but it is absolutely stunning.
Hope you enjoy the rest of September,
Ciao,
Annalisa
