Italian gardens Tag

13 Jun Discover the charm of Villa Lante – a new highlight in our Great Gardens of Italy tour

Posted at 07:12h in Architecture, Destinations, Gardens by Italian Tours

Image by Jeff from Sacromento, CA, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons

In 2024, we were thrilled to include the enchanting Villa Lante in our Great Gardens of Italy tour for the first time. Nestled in Bagnaia, near Viterbo, Villa Lante is a masterpiece of Renaissance garden design, celebrated for its remarkable blend of architecture, sculpture, and landscape art.

A Glimpse into History
Villa Lante was conceived in the late 16th century and primarily designed by the renowned architect Giacomo Barozzi da Vignola. Commissioned by Cardinal Gianfrancesco Gambara, the villa and its gardens were intended as a grand statement of the cardinal’s status and taste. After Gambara’s death, his successor, Cardinal Alessandro Montalto, further enhanced the estate, adding his personal touch to the gardens and buildings.

The villa itself comprises two nearly identical small palaces, or casini, known as Gambara and Montalto. These buildings are adorned with frescoes and intricate architectural details that reflect the Renaissance love for classical antiquity and humanist themes.

The Gardens: A Symphony of Water and Art
The gardens of Villa Lante are a testament to the artistry and engineering of the Renaissance period. Designed to delight and surprise, the gardens feature a series of terraces that cascade down a gentle hillside, each level revealing a new marvel of design. Water is a central theme, ingeniously integrated into the landscape through fountains, cascades, and water chains.

At the heart of the garden lies the Quadrato, a perfectly square parterre enclosed by high box hedges. Here, you will find the magnificent Fontana dei Mori, a complex fountain featuring life-sized statues of Moors holding the heraldic symbols of the Montalto family. This fountain is a focal point, surrounded by meticulously sculpted boxwood and ornate stone decorations.

Another highlight is the Fountain of the Lamps, a circular, multi-tiered fountain where water jets mimic the flickering of oil lamps. This playful use of water continues with the Cardinal’s Table, a long stone table with a central water channel designed to keep food and wine cool during outdoor feasts.

The upper terraces of the garden showcase even more water features and grottos, culminating in the Fountain of the Deluge, a dramatic representation of the biblical flood, complete with sculpted river gods and a water chain that symbolises the rejuvenating power of water.

Experience Villa Lante with Us

In 2025, come to Italy and visit Villa Lante, a place where art, nature, and history converge. These visually stunning gardens are not just a feast for the eyes, but also rich with symbolism and historical significance, making your visit a truly immersive experience.

For more details and to secure your spot, visit our website and download the full itinerary of our popular Italian garden tour. Take advantage of this extraordinary journey into Italy’s botanical treasures!

We are in the process of finalising our 2025 tour programme, so keep an eye on our website, as we are constantly adding new tours.

If you’ve been eyeing a particular tour from our 2024 lineup, please send us an email, and we’ll give you the latest updates on our plans for that tour in 2025.

07 Jan SPRING IS THE TIME TO VISIT ITALY

Posted at 04:23h in Travel Tips by Italian Tours

Springtime is a great time to visit la bella Italia – and here are five good reasons why.

Fewer tourists and temperate weather
With around 46 million people visiting Italy each year (it’s the fifth most visited country in the world), the timing of your visit can be vitally important. The vast majority of visitors to Italy come from other European countries and the peak season for their travel is July and August. You’ll find an April/May/June visit quieter, with smaller crowds and shorter queues. And the weather is warmer but without those searing summer extremes.

Good deals on airfares
Take advantage of the great value airfares that major airlines are releasing right now. For instance, Emirates is offering a spring sale this week that finishes 23 January, and other airlines including Cathay Pacific, Singapore Airlines, Etihad and Qatar all have great offers for European fares.

La bella vita!
After the short days and cold weather of winter, Italians respond to the arrival of spring with what can only be described as euphoria! Almost overnight the piazze come alive as Italians emerge from their winter hibernation. It’s time for the passegiata in gorgeous new clothes, for aperitivi, for gelato and for mingling and laughter and gossip on the streets.

Fabulous festivals
All over Italy, spring is the time for a range of fascinating festivals and celebrations. If you’re joining our Milan and the Lakes tour this year for instance, why not add in some time in Milan to experience the Sagra di San Cristofero, the feast of the patron saint of travelers, that take place on the third Sunday in June? Or bookend your tour with a performance of Don Giovanni or La Boheme at La Scala?

Gorgeous spring gardens
Italy comes alive in a blaze of spring flowers – gorgeous clematis, stunning irises, luscious peony roses and vibrant azaleas, just to name a few. And you’ll see them not only in the gardens but also in planters lining the streets, tumbling out of window boxes and cascading out of the flower stalls and markets as you wander through the city streets. Just breathe in that perfume!

We have three fantastic tours that take advantage of the joys of an Italian spring, so why don’t you think about booking with us now?

The Great Gardens of Italy – 29 April – 13 May 2017
The Road Less Travelled – Puglia – 16 – 30 May 2017
Milan and the Italian Lakes – 2-16 June 2017

20 Nov CURIOUS FACTS ABOUT DA VINCI’S LAST SUPPER

Posted at 04:37h in Art by Italian Tours

Most visitors to Milan will make the pilgrimage to see Leonard da Vinci’s Last Supper in the convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie. This massive painting covered the back wall of the dining hall, inspiring silent reflection among the inhabitants. Most people are also familiar with the subject: the moment at the Last Supper when Jesus announces that one of those present will betray him.

However, there are other aspects to this painting that may well surprise you.

1. The Last Supper is not a fresco: it’s a mural using a technique known as fresco secco. Unlike normal fresco, where painters work on wet plaster so that the pigments become part of the wall, fresco secco mixes pigments with a binding agent, which is applied to a dry wall. The colours are bolder and brighter but, unfortunately, less durable. Within twenty years of its completion the Last Supper began to flake and had almost entirely disappeared a hundred years later.

2. The painting has survived many different violations. In 1625 the monks, believing the painting to be of no further value, cut a doorway through the painting, destroying Jesus feet and part of the table.
– In 1796, Napoleon’s troops used the space as a stable and amused themselves by throwing clay at the Apostles’ faces.
– In 1800 the building was flooded and the painting covered with green mould.
– Many of the seven documented attempts to restore the painting did more harm than good. In the 19^th century restorers, using alcohol and cotton swabs, removed an entire layer of paint.
– In 1943 Allied bombers destroyed the entire monastery. Despite sandbagging, the painting still suffered damage.

3. The most recent restoration was completed in 1999, a 22 year, 50,000 hour project. The project was controversial, with criticism of the type water colour paint and the intensity of colour used. It is estimated that some seventeen per cent of the surface has been completely lost and that less than half of the surface currently visible was actually painted by Da Vinci.

4. This painting continues to excite the imagination with speculation about the recurrence of the number three; the meaning of the spilled salt in front of Judas and the leavened bread; the theory that Da Vinci himself is represented in the figure of St James the Lesser (second Apostle from the left).[/vc_column_text]

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And if you’re interested in more, thriller writer Dan Browne has gone to town with all kinds of mysterious and mystical references in his book The Da Vinci Code.

To visit The Last Supper, you’ll need to book online some months in advance. The convent admits only small groups of about twenty people, for about twenty minutes at a time. Book at the official website to avoid the many scalpers and resellers and their ridiculous fees.

We always visit the Last Supper as part of our Milan and the Italian Lakes tour, next scheduled for June 2017.

24 Oct A SECRET GARDEN IN FLORENCE

Posted at 08:05h in Gardens by Italian Tours

Who doesn’t just love the idea of a secret garden?

Hidden away in Florence, just steps away from well-known tourist sights like the Pitti Palace, is Europe’s largest privately owned garden within an historic centre: the Torrigiani Garden.

The garden is known to have existed in the 1500s, when it first came to fame as a botanical garden, and successive generations of the family have extended and developed it over time.

In the early nineteenth century the owner transformed it into a ‘romantic’ English-style garden. Both the owner and his garden designer were Freemasons and the garden design incorporates a great deal of Masonic symbolism.

Few tourists find their way to this garden, which is open only by prior arrangement. Members of the Torrigiani Malaspina and Torrigiani di Santa Cristina families (often the Marquis himself) lead personalised and highly memorable tours through their magical ten hectare estate.

The garden offers a wealth of riches to the visitor: formal plantings, ancient rare trees, wide lawns and vistas, Roman walls, woodlands, sculptures and even a temple of Arcadia. The family has restored the antique glass houses and built modern greenhouses including a lovely lemon house.

One fascinating feature is the tower, built in 1824 as an astronomical observatory. It contains a library, a collection of astronomical instruments and an open terrace for star-gazing. Its three levels also allude to the Masonic initiation process, so you can imagine all sorts of alchemy happening in this romantic space.

These days the garden performs several functions: it continues to be an important botanical resource; as a gardening and crafts workshop centre; and the family provides fresh herbs to local restaurants.

As many visitors have observed, a visit to Torrigiani Garden is the closest you can get to experiencing the life of a wealthy old Florentine family.

A visit to the Torrigiani Garden is always one of the highlights for guests on our Great Gardens of Italy tour. Our next tour is running in April and May 2017 so if you would like to visit this and other fascinating gardens in Rome, Florence, Verona and Lake Como, contact Luca today.