Palazzo Wedekind
The Palazzo Wedekind is an important city palace in Rome .
location
The Palazzo Wedekind is located in the city center at the Piazza Colonna and the Marc Aurel column there . In the immediate vicinity are the Palazzo Chigi , seat of the Italian Prime Minister , and the Palazzo Montecitorio , seat of the Chamber of Deputies . The palazzo is now owned by the Italian social security agency INPS , whose management is housed there. One floor is rented to the newspaper il tempo .
history
The palazzo has an eventful history. Although it was built for the Bolognese patrician family Ludovisi in 1659 , it did not get its name until the 19th century. For a long time it served as the seat of Vizegerenten the Cardinal Vicar of Rome, then from 1814 as the headquarters of the Directorate General of Post of the Papal States .
Under Pope Gregory XVI. the palazzo was significantly redesigned. This by Pietro Camporese d. J. carried out the reconstruction according to plans by Giuseppe Valadier is significant in terms of art history because twelve columns were built in from the ruins of Veji . It is the last large Roman palazzo to use ancient building elements. The two columns flanking the entrance gate are from a later period. They come from the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls, which burned down in 1823 .
After the elimination of the Papal States by the Kingdom of Italy, the building was temporarily assigned to the Italian Ministry of Education as an official residence. The German-Italian merchant Karl Wedekind later acquired the palazzo and relocated the headquarters of his bank there. Under Karl Wedekind, the interior of the building was redesigned according to plans by the architect Giovanni Battista Giovenale (1848–1934), later president of the Accademia di San Luca .
Later on, the Sommariva coffee house was set up on the ground floor. It was also called Caffè delle Colonne because of the columns and was very popular because of the waitresses and their Bavarian costumes . Otherwise there were various other organizations in the palazzo, including a journalists' association.
From September 1943 the Palazzo Wedekind served as the headquarters of the fascist party , and after the liberation of Rome in June 1944 as the seat of the National Liberation Committee . After the war, the palazzo became the property of a real estate company owned by the social security agency INPS. In the post-war period, however, the building became known as the seat of the Roman daily newspaper il tempo , to which it was rented. In 2015, the newspaper reduced usage to the third floor for cost reasons. The INPS director and his management team moved into the piano nobile .
literature
- Stefan Grundmann , Ulrich Fürst: The architecture of Rome, An architectural history in 400 presentations. 1998, p. 283.
- Giorgio Carpaneto: I palazzi di Roma , Rome 2004
- German Gender Book , Volume 187, Limburg 1982, p. 565
Web links
Coordinates: 41 ° 54 ′ 2.5 ″ N , 12 ° 28 ′ 45.5 ″ E