1 June 2018
Parco della Villa Reale di Marlia
The Villa Reale at Marlia has been the residence of aristocratic families and great art patrons over many generations and many changes of hand.
In the early 1800s Napoleon's sister, Princess Elisa Baciocchi, extended the majestic complex. She modernised the ancient Palazzo Orsetti and the entrance loggias following the taste of the times. However, she left the splendid eighteenth century gardens intact with the green theatre shaped out of the vegetation as well as the Camellia Avenue, distinguished by its many rare varieties from the nineteenth century. After Napoleon's downfall, the Dukes of Parma, followed by the Grand Dukes of Tuscany, owned the villa which, on the Unity of Italy, passed to Vittorio Emanuele. The King ceded it to Prince Carlo, son of the last King of the Two Sicilies, who then put the villa up for sale, the furniture for auction and cut down many trees in the park for firewood in order to honour the debts of his son.
Count and Countess Pecci-Blunt bought the villa in 1923 and commissioned a famous French architect, Jacques Greber, to carry out work in the garden: to create woodland, streams and a lake as a great, romantic complement to the series of classical Italian gardens from the time of the Orsetti family. Amongst the illustrious visitors from the past were the violinist and composer Paganini, members of all the European Royal families and the American artist John Singer Sargent, who painted watercolours of scenes in the villa.
In 2015 a young couple, having fallen head over heels in love with the by now neglected complex, bought the property accepting the challenge to revive the Villa Reale at Marlia to its ancient splendour by commissioning important restoration works both in the buildings and in the gardens.
In the early 1800s Napoleon's sister, Princess Elisa Baciocchi, extended the majestic complex. She modernised the ancient Palazzo Orsetti and the entrance loggias following the taste of the times. However, she left the splendid eighteenth century gardens intact with the green theatre shaped out of the vegetation as well as the Camellia Avenue, distinguished by its many rare varieties from the nineteenth century. After Napoleon's downfall, the Dukes of Parma, followed by the Grand Dukes of Tuscany, owned the villa which, on the Unity of Italy, passed to Vittorio Emanuele. The King ceded it to Prince Carlo, son of the last King of the Two Sicilies, who then put the villa up for sale, the furniture for auction and cut down many trees in the park for firewood in order to honour the debts of his son.
Count and Countess Pecci-Blunt bought the villa in 1923 and commissioned a famous French architect, Jacques Greber, to carry out work in the garden: to create woodland, streams and a lake as a great, romantic complement to the series of classical Italian gardens from the time of the Orsetti family. Amongst the illustrious visitors from the past were the violinist and composer Paganini, members of all the European Royal families and the American artist John Singer Sargent, who painted watercolours of scenes in the villa.
In 2015 a young couple, having fallen head over heels in love with the by now neglected complex, bought the property accepting the challenge to revive the Villa Reale at Marlia to its ancient splendour by commissioning important restoration works both in the buildings and in the gardens.
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Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures- Henry Ward Beecher Read - |
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