Villa San Fermo

Once upon a time in Lonigo there were princes, and today their villa still stands on the hill, overlooking the town like a belvedere. A Benedictine monastery dedicated to the Veronese martyrs Fermo and Rustico was established here as early as the 10th century, dependent on the Abbey of San Benedetto di Polirone (Mantua). In the 15th century, it passed under the jurisdiction of the canons of San Giorgio in Alga (Venice). In 1668, the congregation was suppressed and the Lonigo monastery was purchased by the Venetian families Venier and later Contarini, following the practice of the Serenissima to invest in suppressed ecclesiastical properties, exploiting the agricultural lands and buildings as farms and summer residences. In 1834, the Giovanelli family succeeded the Contarini by hereditary right, incorporating into the property the small convent of San Bonaventura, known as “La Cappuccina,” and the hermitage of Santa Colomba on the summit of the hill. The abbey complex was transformed into a princely residence, preserving the cloister, the church, and the towers, which gave the villa the appearance of a modern manor overlooking the town of Lonigo.

The villa revolves around the large cloister, at the center of which the well with the precious sculpted wellhead dated 1556 has been preserved. On the east side, the space has been irreparably altered by the modern construction of the school building and the terrible glass passage: once, leaving the cloister, the view ranged from the garden to the airy quadrangular courtyard surrounded by servants’ quarters, greenhouses, the small theater, the Cavallerizza (covered riding hall), and the ascent to the tennis courts and the surprising English-style park, designed by G. Balzaretto, the “wizard of Milanese gardens.” It was the Meduna brothers, Venetian engineers and architects, who designed the external appearance of the villa, open to the park and the town, which aimed to be “modern,” devoid of classical references: indeed, the frames of doors and windows have a hint of Art Nouveau, the shutters are folding, parapets and railings are cast iron, and the canopy above the portal recalls Parisian metro stations more than monumental entrances. On either side of the entrance are two halls with large windows that were greenhouses for oranges and cedars, as well as winter gardens, one of which is now a chapel. The vault of the atrium is decorated with noble coats of arms in finest stucco; the grand staircase, with its floral railing and steps compartmentalized with goldsmith-like precision, leads to the piano nobile with the three halls facing west, from which one enjoys a memorable panorama from Monte Baldo to the Modenese Apennines. The first is the library and audience hall, with refined original cherry wood furnishings: parquet, monumental doors, and library cabinets in eclectic style, the work of exquisite cabinetmakers. The ceiling speaks of the Prince’s literary preferences, with medallions of Dante and Beatrice, Petrarch and Laura; at the center, a tondo painted by Mosè Bianchi, like a glimpse of sky in which Paolo and Francesca, the damned lovers from Dante’s Inferno, soar. The double door opens onto the Red Room, called the Tapestry Room for the Stories of Semiramis once hung beside the fireplace. This hall, which was the scene of festivities with crowned heads, is embellished by the red marble door frames and a black touchstone fireplace from the Contarini Palace in Venice, adorned with delightful Delft ceramics, over which a bust with a military triumph and the Giovanelli coat of arms was placed. But for the ceiling, the Doge’s Palace in Venice was taken as a model, with gilded carvings and stuccos and three ovals cut into the sky, for whose subjects, modern but in a mythological key, M. Bianchi went to Venice to study Veronese and Tiepolo. In bold and skillful foreshortening, Peace is represented as favoring development and prosperity in the world. Southern oval: Mercury, god of human activities, flies across the skies together with a most tender Flora with butterfly wings.

Northern oval: Mars, god of war, descends from a menacing cloudbank, haughty and heedless of the supplicating mothers among the arrayed cannons. Central oval: Peace, with Glory and History, celebrates her triumph, which the four continents will enjoy, symbolically represented. A carved and gilded band connects the walls with the ceiling, punctuating scenes of children’s games, as if looking out from small windows onto the world of adults. The third hall is called the music room because here the Princess used to have chamber music or piano music performed: it is the most refined and graceful environment. A delicate framework of stuccos frames the dancing Seasons and simulates the grid of a pergola at whose center appears a Flora (painted by Bianchi) supported by putti while scattering the flowers of spring on the earth; and these descend along the glaucous walls like a magnificent dance of corollas and relief and painted stucco racemes (designed by L. Scrosati). In the northern wing of the villa, accessed from the cloister, are the most intimate rooms of the princely family, such as the Fireplace sitting room, with white medallions by Caremi depicting tender childhood games in relief and vivid garlands of flowers blooming from the brush of Luigi Scrosati. But his brilliant invention was to “break through” the low ceiling of an adjacent room, illusionistically creating an airy rococo balustrade against the background of a midday sky, crossed by the still-winged flights of pigeons from the square, and thus the room burdened by an oppressive ceiling becomes the Hall of Doves. The happy hand of this Milanese decorator is also responsible for the floral garlands of the apartments for important guests, located in the towers.

The park of Villa San Fermo occupies one of the last southern offshoots of the Berici Hills. The property extends over approximately 30 hectares, devoted to vineyards, olive groves, and woods; only a small part, approximately 10 hectares, is still parkland, and thanks to it one can reconstruct the grandeur of the original garden.

Born from the ingenuity of the Milanese architect Giuseppe Balzaretti, the English-style park began to take shape in conjunction with the reconstruction work on the villa after the fire of 1855. Initially, the terrain had to be modeled, carriage roads designed to connect the various buildings inserted in the park but, above all, irrigation organized, without which a garden cannot exist. Thus, rainwater collection basins were created at different altimetric levels, so as to convey them to the vegetable garden, the greenhouses, the villa’s winter garden, and finally to the lake, directly connected to the Brendola canal.

Four levels with defined functions can be identified in the property: the Entrance of the Rivers, which brings the park into the city center, the Villa, La Cappuccina (old monastery with adjoining church), and Santa Colomba.