Discovering the Ville Palladiane

Vicenza is a city to be experienced in every detail, a place where art and architecture are perfectly combined with the urban layout. If you find yourself exploring it, we recommend that you dedicate some of your time to discovering the extraordinary villas of Palladio.

Built around the mid 1500s by the architect Andrea Palladio, the Ville Palladiane are around sixty and are characterized above all by the originality of the structures, purely inspired by classical art, and by the sumptuous interiors. The villas were in fact commissioned by aristocrats or rich exponents of the bourgeoisie, who wanted residences located in quiet places, where they could relax and enjoy the view of the vineyards: real temple houses that not only transmitted beauty but became icons of culture, delight and power.

Palladio structured his villas following a general line that included the kitchen, pantries and cellars on the ground floor, the residence of the lords on the first floor and in the attic a very important space for storing grain. Besides the central body of the villa there were adjacent structures to offer accommodation to the servants and farmers and to store work tools. The union between the villas and the characteristic Venetian landscape would then have formed a unique style of its kind.

From the most famous La Rotonda in Villa Foscari (or Malcontenta), from the Olympic Theater in Palazzo Chiericati: where will you start your visit?

 

A land to discover:

History: retrace about 6 centuries of Venetian history and architecture within the walls of the villas

Art: admire unique structures with a strong reference to Palladian classicism and classical Roman architecture

Panorama: the villas fit perfectly with the typical Venetian landscape made of vineyards and cultivated fields, a feature that makes Palladian villas unique in the world.

 

Credits

Picture: www.tgcom24.mediaset.it