Villino Florio

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View of Villino Florio with the gable front facing the street

The Villino Florio , also known as Villino Florio all'Olivuzza , is an Art Nouveau villa in Palermo built between 1899 and 1902 according to plans by the architect Ernesto Basile . The building initially served as a private residence for the client Vincenzo Florio . After several years of vacancy, the villa was badly damaged by fire in 1962. The listed building became the property of the Autonomous Region of Sicily in 1984 , which carried out extensive renovation work in the house. After being used as an office, the Villino Florio has been open to the public as a museum since 2016.

description

View of Villino Florio with double external stairs and corner turrets

The Villino (German: small villa ) is located in Viale Regina Margherita No. 38 in the Zisa district of Palermo. This area outside the city walls belonged to the Genoardo Park in the time of the Normans , which roughly means paradise on earth . This park landscape was later given the name Olivuzza , which is still evidenced by the suffix all'Olivuzza on some buildings. In the 19th century, several wealthy families had their palaces and villas built here, including the Villa Malfitano Whitaker , the Palazzo Butera-Wilding all'Olivuzza and the Villa Belmonte Ventimiglia . The Florio family had the Palazzo Florio Wirz and the Palazzo Florio Fitalia all'Olivuzza built in this area .

The Florio family, originally from Calabria , was one of the most important entrepreneurs in Sicily in the 19th century. The Florios traded in Marsala wine and cognac , owned a canning factory for tuna and operated their own shipping company . In 1891 the head of the family, Ignazio Florio, died and the property passed to his children. For their son Vincenzo Florio, born in 1883, the family acquired a large park-like piece of land in the Olivuzza district between 1893 and 1898 , on which a house of his own - the Villino Florio - was to be built for him.

Interior with floral details: door frame with colored glass skylight, wood carving and textile wallpaper

When the architect Ernesto Basile from Palermo received the building contract in 1899, the client Vincenzo Florio was only 16 years old. For the bachelor, Basile was to build a villino , which was intended as a private residence and where Florio could meet his friends. The outside of the villa appears in the style of eclecticism with a double external staircase, Romanesque columns, elements from the Renaissance and the Baroque , terraces, balconies, bay windows and a cylindrical turret. Details are reminiscent of the architecture of French castles, which Vincenzo Florio knew from his travels in France. Basile cleverly combined the various style quotations into an independent whole, which is considered a highlight in the architect's work.

Inside, the floors were tailored to the client's different needs. On the ground floor - with direct access to the garden - there was a billiard room and a playroom for leisure activities. The representation rooms such as the large salon and dining room were on the first floor, which can be reached from the outside via the large flight of stairs . Inside, a large wooden staircase leads to the second floor, where the private living rooms and bedrooms were. In addition to Ernesto Basile, other artists and artisans worked on the original furnishings: Giuseppe Enea and Ettore De Maria Bergler executed the wall paintings, Salvatore Gregorietti created stained glass windows and some of the furniture came from Vittorio Ducrot . The interior fittings, made from high-quality materials, featured mainly floral decorative elements. The various wood carvings, textile wall coverings, tiles or door fittings were coordinated in their ornamental language and harmonized with one another.

Ignazio Florio initially lived for a few years as a bachelor in Villino Florio and devoted himself to his various leisure activities, including the Targa Florio car race he founded in 1906 . In 1909 he married Annina Alliata di Montereale and the Villino Florio was the scene of festive receptions. One of the most famous guests was the German Emperor Wilhelm II , who was visiting Villino Florio while on a stay in Sicily. After only two years of marriage, Florio's wife Annina died of cholera in 1911 at the age of 26 . After Vincenzo Florio married the French Lucie Henry the following year, he lived partly in France, where he also died in 1959. The large park of Villino Florio, which was hardly used for decades, was parceled out in the 1930s and then built on with apartment blocks. The current building site of the Villino Florio only comprises a fragment of the former park and consists of a small garden surrounding the house.

On the night of November 23rd to 24th, 1962, the Villino Floria was badly damaged by fire. In this fire, probably caused by arson, the interior of the house was almost completely destroyed and the exterior of the villa was partially damaged. In the same month the initiative Salviamo Villa Florio Committee was founded , which called for the rescue of the building, which has been a listed building since 1954. Though there were already considerations in December 1962 to buy and repair the Villino Floria with state money, the building could not be acquired by the administration of the Ente per i Palazzi e le Ville di Sicilia for 140 million lire until 1975 . The first renovation work began in 1981. After the dissolution of this institution, the Autonomous Region of Sicily took over the property in 1984 and initiated further renovation work, which was carried out with the help of funds from the European Union and lasted until 2009. For example, the textile wall coverings with their flower patterns were made according to old templates and attached to the Villino. In the case of decorative woodwork, the restorers decided to keep the charred originals in part and to replace them with replicas for other elements. After the restoration, the building initially housed the offices of the Dipartimento Regionale per l'Architettura e l'Arte Contemporanea ( regional department for architecture and contemporary art ). The Villino Florio has been open to the public as a museum since January 2016 and exemplifies the living culture of an entrepreneurial villa in Palermo at the time of the Belle Époque .

literature

Web links

Commons : Villino Florio (Palermo)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 38 ° 7 ′ 10.4 ″  N , 13 ° 20 ′ 37 ″  E