Categoria POI: Art and Culture

Built close to the ancient walls of the Scaliger Castle, the villa is located in an elevated position above the town of Valeggio sul Mincio, in perfect harmony with the surrounding landscape.
A typical example of a holiday residence, it stands out for its decidedly avant-garde comforts for the time: heating systems with radiators, furnishings and sanitary fittings of refined elegance and ingenuity, an external room used as a garage for one of the first cars in Valeggio.
The hanging garden above the park, whose irrigation was entrusted to an ingenious system of wells, leads to an elegant loggia richly frescoed and decorated with mullioned windows with a view of the nearby Valeggio and the gentle moraine hills.

The entrance gate is in Art Nouveau style, with delicate wrought iron ornaments and the name of the villa carved on one of the front columns.
In 1929, its owner, Giuseppe Zamboni, bequeathed it for public use in favour of a kindergarten and it has been owned by the municipality ever since.
Citizens’ groups have long been working to restore the villa to its former glory through guided tours, information stalls and fundraising.

In Piazza Carlo Alberto you can admire the historic seat of the city government: the Palazzo Municipale.
Its façade is characterised by a high entrance portal, set between mighty columns supporting the balcony, onto which the door to the vast council chamber opens. In perfect neoclassical style, the building of Valeggio’s town hall dates back to the second half of the 18th century, when the central square took the shape we know today.

Towards the end of the 18th century, having overcome the tragic consequences of a devastating plague and a disastrous war, the agriculture and craft activities had gone back to production, the town centre had been rebuilt and the Town Hall marked the rebirth of a destroyed town.
During French rule (1805-1815) the palace underwent radical transformations. Only the main floor was used for the public while the ground floor was converted into houses and rooms for commercial and craft use: the first coffee shop in the town was opened here.
From 1815, the Veneto was subject to the Austrian crown and the Town Hall became the seat of the Imperial Regia Deputazione Comunale until the annexation to the Kingdom of Italy in October 1866.

Palazzo Guarienti stands in the historical centre of the town. It dates back to the 18th century and is known by the people of Valeggio as the ‘patriot’s palace’, the country residence of the Marquis Guarienti of Verona. The imposing building was designed by one of the least known Veronese architects of the 18th century, Piero Ceroni, who worked in Valeggio between 1770 and 1775 and about whom very little is known.

In strict neoclassical style, more severe than elegant, the palace has three large, massive entrance doors dominating the façade, on which rests a balcony surmounted by an eagle with spread wings. On the left, a plaque commemorates the evening of 30 May 1796, when Napoleon Bonaparte, having taken lodgings in the palace, risked being attacked by the Austrians who suddenly appeared in the town. On the opposite side, another plaque commemorates the centenary of the death of Don Giovanni Beltrame, an illustrious Valeggiano missionary and explorer in Africa as well as a great scholar.

In the centre of Borghetto, there is a small Church of San Marco Evangelista, dating back to the 18th century. The structure, built on the remains of an 11th-century Romanesque parish church and dedicated to St Mary, follows a neoclassical style with a single nave and a lowered vault.
At the back, the old village cemetery, restored in the 1920s, contains the oldest and most significant tombstones of local history. From here there is a particular view of the apse of the old Romanesque church with its Cluniac plan, the only surviving part of the old monastery.
In the nearby Scaligera tower, a belfry has been created: among the sacred bells, one bears the date 1381 in Gothic letters.

Its solemn and evocative chime can only be heard on twelve occasions during the liturgical year. To the right of the churchyard, several inscriptions on marble recall the main battles fought on the banks of the Mincio. To the left of the entrance portal, in a niche, the Madonna painted by F. Bellomi in 1980 and a water fountain enhance the serene beauty of the place.

Villa Sigurtà is a magnificent Venetian villa used as a summer residence by the Counts Maffei, lords of Valeggio and Monzambano in 1649. It was designed and built by architect Vincenzo Pellesina, who was inspired by the masterpieces of the more famous Palladio. The Veronese architect completed the work at the peak of his career and his style bears witness to the stylistic transition between the decline of the Baroque and the emerging more linear Neoclassical style.

In the tympanum, above the richly frescoed loggia, a plaque recalls the old investiture of the Maffei family. During the wars of the Risorgimento this elegant residence hosted Carlo Alberto, Radetzky (1848) and Napoleon III (1859).
Since 2020, it has been open for visitors, with paths between the villa and the magical private garden of about 3 hectares, offering a place full of history, beauty and poetry, where you can spend moments in pleasant company.

The parish church of San Pietro in Cattedra, with its strikingly unusual façade embellished by a beautiful bronze portal, was built in 1753, on the remains of an earlier 17th-century church, but some documents testify to a Romanesque parish church standing there as early as 1145.

While the façade remains incomplete, lacking the marble and plaster finishes envisaged in the project, a massive 19th-century altarpiece inside a large nave grabs the attention. On the left there is a magnificent pipe organ (1812) by G.B. Sona, of the 18th-century Veneto-Gardesana school, fully restored and in perfect working condition.
The 16th-century chapel of the Oratory stands in the small square on the left side of the church.
Recently restored, it is the oldest sacred building in Valeggio.