Tourism

Vicenza is a city in northern Italy, it is the capital of the eponymous province in the Veneto region, at the northern base of the Monte Berico, straddling the Bacchiglione. Vicenza is approximately 60 km west of Venice and 200 km east of Milan. As of 2007 Vicenza had an estimated population of 119,038.
The surrounding country is agricultural, but there are also quarries of marble, sulphur, copper, and silver mines, and beds of lignite and kaolin; mineral springs also abound, the most famous being those of Recoaro.

The city has an active and lively industrial sector, which is especially famous for jewelry and clothing factories. The Gold Exposition is world-famous and it takes place in Vicenza three times per year (January, May, and September). Other industries worthy of mention are the woolen and silk, pottery, and musical instruments. The headquarters of the bicycle component manufacturer Campagnolo are located here.

http://www.filcoo.com/img/mark.gifArrival

By Plane

Vicenza has its own airport (Dal Molin), which is currently operating for military purposes and civilian national and international routes.
However, there are another two convenient passenger airports nearby, for both national and international scheduled flights: Venezia Tessera (Venice's Marco Polo Airport) and Verona Villafranca (Verona's Valerio Catullo Airport). From these airports it is possible to get to Vicenza by means of fast train and coach links. Treviso also is served by it own airport, “San Giuseppe”, where only charter flights operate.

By Train

Vicenza is on the main Brescia-Padua train route and is therefore well-served and easily reachable by train: at just 2 hours from Milan, a hour and a half from Bologna and just 20 minutes from Padua and Verona. The latter two are provided with frequent main-line train connections to Rome.
Once at Vicenza's railway station, no matter where you arrive from, you can easily get to any of Veneto's cities by means of easy and fast train services.

By Car

Vicenza is an hour away from Milan, one and a half hours from Bologna and 30 minutes from Venice and Verona. There are three motorway junctions: two on the A4 Serenissima Brescia-Padua motorway (Vicenza East and Vicenza West) on the major route from Turin to Trieste.
The third (Vicenza North) one is the A31 Valdastico motorway exit, which connects Vicenza to the A4 motorway and to its province, in particular the North-Eastern areas such as Thiene, Schio, and Asiago for reaching Vicenza, Marostica, and Bassano.
Other motorway exits are Verona Sud (for those who're traveling from the Brenner or Bologna-Milan motorways) and Padua if traveling from Rome, Florence or Bologna.
There are also main roads that connect the city of Vicenza with the other main Veneto cities: the SS11 “Padana Inferiore” and “Superiore” main road to Verona and Padua, the 46 Pasubio to Trento, the 248 “Marosticana” to Bassano, the SS247 “Riviera Berica” to Este and the SS246 to Valdagno and Recoaro.

By Bus

Adjacent to the Railway Station, there's Vicenza's Bus Station, the very last stop for bus services coming from the hinterland, from other regions and from abroad to Vicenza.

http://www.filcoo.com/img/mark.gifHistory and Culture

Roman Age
Vicentia was settled by the Italic Euganei and then by the Palaeo-Veneti in the 2nd-3rd century BC, from whom it was taken by the Gauls. The Romans conquered it to the latter in 157 BC, giving the city the name of Vicetia or Vincentia (“victorious”).
The Vicentini received the Roman citizenship in 49 BC. The city had some importance as a hub on the important road from Mediolanum to Aquileia, but was overshadowed by its neighbor Patavium (Padua). Little survives of the Roman city, but three of the bridges across the Bacchiglione and Retrone Rivers are of Roman origin, and isolated arches of a Roman aqueduct exist outside Porta Santa Croce.
During the decline of the Western Roman Empire, Heruls, Vandals, Alaric and Huns laid the area to waste, but the city recovered after the Ostrogoth conquest in 489. It was also an important Lombard and then Frank centre. Numerous Benedictine monasteries were built in Vicenza area, which, in particular, dried the lake that once was located north of Vicenza.

Middle Ages
In 899 Vicenza was destroyed by Magyar raiders. In 1001 Otto III handed over the government of the city to the bishop, and its communal organization had an opportunity to develop, separating soon from the Episcopal authority. It took an active part in the League with Verona and, most of all, in the Lombard League (1164-1167) against Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa compelling Padua and Treviso to join: its podesta, Ezzelino II il Balbo, was captain of the league. When peace was restored, however, the old rivalry with Padua, Bassano, and other cities was renewed, besides which there were the internal factions of the Vivaresi (Ghibellines) and the Maltraversi (Guelphs).
The tyrannical Ezzelino III drove the Guelphs out of Vicenza, and caused his brother, Alberico, to be elected podesta (1230). The independent commune joined the Second Lombard League against Emperor Frederick II, and was sacked by that monarch (1237), after which it was annexed to Ezzelino's dominions. On his death the old oligarchic republic political structure was restored -a consiglio maggiore (“grand council”) of four hundred members and a consiglio minore (“small council”) of forty members - and it formed a league with Padua, Treviso and Verona. Three years later the Vicentines entrusted the protection of the city to Padua, so as to safeguard republican liberty; but this protectorate (custodia) quickly became dominion, and for that reason Vicenza in 1311 submitted to the Scaligeri lords of Verona, who fortified it against the Visconti of Milan.
Vicenza came under rule of Venice in 1404, and its subsequent history is that of Venice. It was besieged by the Emperor Sigismund, and Maximilian I held possession of it in 1509 and 1516.

Modern age
Vicenza was a candidate to host the council of Trento. The 16th century, however, was the century of Andrea Palladio, who left many outstanding examples of his art with palaces and villas in the city's territory.
After 1797, under Napoleonic rule, it was made a duche grand-fief (not a grand duchy, but a hereditary (extinguished in 1896), nominal duchy, a rare honor reserved for French officials) within Bonaparte's personal Kingdom of Italy for general Caulaincourt, also imperial Grand-Ecuyer.
After 1814 Vicenza passed to the Austrian Empire. In 1848, however, it rose against Austria, but was recovered after a stubborn resistance. As a part of the Kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia, it was annexed to Italy after the 3rd war of Italian independence.
Vicenza's area was a location of fights in both World War I and World War II. After the end of the latter, a strong economical development made it one of the richest cities in Italy.
Vicenza is home to the United States Army post Caserma Ederle (Camp Ederle), also known as the U.S. Army Garrison Vicenza. In 1965, Caserma Ederle became the headquarters for the Southern European Task Force, and today is the central U.S. military installation in Southern Europe.
In January 2006 the European Gendarmerie Force was inaugurated in Vicenza.

http://www.filcoo.com/img/mark.gifChurches and Museums

The Cathedral
The cathedral, dedicated to Santa Maria Maggiore, though essentially Gothic, is however the result of work from different periods. One of the most significant was the covering of the tribune, carried out under Palladio's direction in 1565, and the construction of the dome in 1574. The door on the south side of the church - flanked by two Corinthian pillars which support an architrave decorated with festoons - is also from this period; some believe this to be the work of Palladio and, in any case, the man who commissioned it, Canon Paolo Almerico, was the same who commissioned Palladio's Villa Capra, known as the “Rotonda”.

Chiesa di S.Maria Nuova
This little church, probably designed by Palladio around 1578, was built after his death, between 1585 and 1589. Curved and straight motifs alternate along the whole facade: the four demicolumns which support the tympanum, the curvature of the great arch, the side niches and the oculus in the tympanum. In the interior, the single rectangular nave is crowned by Corinthian columns similar to those of the facade.

Basilica Palladiana
On 11 April 1549, the Council of One Hundred, responsible for the Gothic "Palazzo della Ragione" decided to commission Palladio to do this job. Palladio's plan - on which he worked all his life and which was only completed in 1614, after his death - envisaged that the earlier building be enclosed on three sides (the east being occupied by a pre-existing structure) within a grandiose double order of loggias, organized in the style of Serliana or Venetian windows (now also known as Palladian windows). The enormous interior space, a single hall, is covered by a keel-shaped roof which gives the basilica its characteristic appearance, recognizable above the city's skyline, even from a distance.

Cappella Valmarana
This evocative patrician chapel is situated beside the crypt, below the presbytery in the church of Santa Corona, one of the most significant examples of Romanesque-Gothic Dominican architecture in the Vicenza area. It was designed by Palladio in 1576 for the nobleman, Antonio Valmarana, who wished to be entombed there. It was not until 1597 that Leonardo Valmarana decided to have it built, respecting the original plan, however, with its two lateral apses, linked by a fine vault, providing wings for the simple altar defined by two grooved columns bearing a tympanum and two pilasters.

http://www.filcoo.com/img/mark.gifHistorical buildings and monuments

Teatro Olimpico
The Accademia Olimpica established in 1555, with those cultural functions which were common to all the academies founded in Italy during the sixteenth century decided to commission a theatre for staging classical plays. The design proposed by Palladio was accepted and work started just a few months before his death. It was completed by his successor Vincenzo Scamozzi. Like a Greek theatre, Palladio's last and original work consists of a cavea (seating space), a proscenium and fixed architectural scenery which represents the three streets of the ancient city of Thebes, even though the three architectonic perspectives bear a greater resemblance to Renaissance streets, or indeed the streets of Vicenza indeed, than to those of a Greek polis.

Arco delle Scalette
The monumental conclusion of the flight of steps which leads to the sanctuary of Monte Berico was erected in 1595 as shown by an inscription on the front. The model draws on the constructional scheme of ancient Roman triumphal arches, with a high arch flanked by Corinthian columns, terminated by an attic topped by statues by G. B. Albanese: a scheme which recalls the paternity of Palladio, as testified by one in the drawings of Lord Burlington's collection in London. Two niches, inside the piers of the arch, house statues of the Announcing Angel and the Virgin Annunciate respectively, the work of the sculptor, Orazio Marinali.

Palazzo Capra
This is the remaining part of a palace from the first half of the sixteenth century and is considered by some scholars to be an early work of Palladio's, subsequently incorporated into Palazzo Piovini-Beltrame, designed in the seventeenth century by the architect Antonio Pizzocaro. The motif of the two grooved pilasters which flank the portal on the ground floor is repeated and doubled in the definition of the three-mullioned window on the piano nobile, supporting the classical tympanum which tops the structure.

Palazzo Civena Trissino
One of Palladio's early works, this building shows the influence of Renaissance architecture in Rome. Begun in 1540, as a medal commemorating the start of the work testifies, it was completed about two years later. The piano nobile, consisting of five windows divided by double Corinthian pilasters rests on an elegant portico in which the contrast between the arches and the light ashlars work is mediated by round and rectangular niches cut into the pilasters.

Palazzo Angaran
The building was probably commissioned from Palladio around 1560 by Bernardo da Schio and comprises a robust base on which the rustication acts as an ornamental element, highlighting the portal and the little arched cellar windows with large ashlars arranged in rays. On the piano nobile there are three windows topped by tympanums and separated by Corinthian demicolumns, in a style which later becomes characteristic of Palladio, though with many variations and inventions. The rear of the palazzo looks out over an original garden on the bank of the River Bacchiglione.

Palazzo Porto Breganze
Palladio was probably the author of the design for this palazzo, begun - but not concluded by Vincenzo Scamozzi, towards the end of the Cinquecento. The only three demicolumns remaining were to have been completed by another five and it is possible to imagine how the palace would have been if it had been finished: there would have been a lightening of the weight upwards, starting from the high base and from the rustication from the first floor upwards, to the balconies of the piano nobile and the elegant Corinthian capitals connected by festoons rich in classical motifs.

Loggia Valmarana
This elegant feature of the Giardino Salvi consists of five arches, which sink their piers into the waters of the Seriola, and six classical Tuscan columns surmounted by a tympanum. It was probably built at the end of the Cinquecento commissioned by Leonardo Valmarana - the humanist and expert in Palladian architecture - whose name is inscribed in the architrave and who, indeed, may have designed this little building which lives in symbiosis with the water bank, sharing its vibrations and atmosphere.

La Rotonda
This is one of the most famously and imitated buildings in the world, the characteristics of which served to illustrate and sum up the stylistic features of Italian Renaissance architecture. Palladio designed it between 1566 and 1571, commissioned by the intellectual canon, Paolo Almerico, and included it in his Quattro Libri. The original structure consists of a central block, topped by a dome, and with a pronaos on each of the four sides. These four Ionic hexastyle foreparts are completed by flights of steps which seem to anchor the villa to the hill on which it stands. The construction work was carried on, with a few modifications, by Vincenzo Scamozzi and was only completely finished in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries with the interior frescos by Alessandro Maganza and by Louis Dorigny.

Villa Pisani
The house which the Pisani brothers commissioned form Palladio, around 1544, for the centre of their land at Bagnolo di Lonigo, along a stream, represents, in all its compositional elements, the type of villa which the noble landowners of Vicenza and Venice were having built in the thirty years from 1530 to 1560. Here, a short curved flight of steps gives access to a central nucleus, consisting of a three-arched portico, with robust rusticated ribbing and topped by a simple tympanum. This is flanked by two lateral bodies with smooth walls in which two simple rectangular windows open, one on the first and one on the second floor.

Villa Marcello
The corpus of Palladio's drawings, now conserved in the Burlington collection in London, includes a project quite similar to this villa, located at Bertesina in the immediate vicinity of Vicenza. The unity of the facade is given by the eight Ionic pilasters which rise from a high base and which link the triple-arched portico to the short side wings which flank it. A tympanum surmounts the portico, inaugurating a usage which will become canonical in Palladian architecture over the coming years.

Villa Trissino
This is the house which the man of letters and humanist Giangiorgio Trissino had built, between 1531 and 1538, restructuring a pre-existing Gothic structure, immersed in a large park in the locality of Cricoli in the outskirts of Vicenza. He gave the structure classical rhythms, adding an arched portico on the ground floor and, on the piano nobile, windows with tympanums which lighten the severe mass of the corner towers. It was probably at this time, during the work, that the nobleman from Vicenza met the young stonemason, Andrea della Gondola, to whom he gave the lofty name of “Palladio”, introducing him into the world of art and ancient culture and setting him off on his fulgent architectural career.

Loggia del Capitaniato
Situated in Piazza dei Signori, facing the Basilica, it was designed by Palladio as the official residence of the Capitanio (a military authority instituted by the Venetian government) in 1571 as witnessed by the inscription on the right-hand architrave. The white stucco work and the stone statues which decorate the building commemorate the Venetian victory over the Turks at the battle of Lepanto (7 October 1571) and provide a contrast to the red brick surface of the wall facing. The three imposing arches of the portico are highlighted by the demicolumns of the gigantic order which soar up to the balustrade of the attic, in a style which is characteristic of the later works of the great Veneto architect.

Casa Cogollo
As several documents show, this house was built between 1560 and 1570 and it is apocryphal that Palladio himself lived here. There is no doubt, however, that he designed this small building, the home of a notary, endowing it with all the elegance of the large and much more important houses he built for Venetian patricians. On the ground floor, the facade opens with a serliana framed by two Ionic columns. The two windows and the two grooved pilasters on the piano nobile provide a frame for a section of wall which, along with the second floor attic, was decorated with frescos, now lost, by Giovanni Antonio Fasolo.k and wood, English and Italian-style gardens and a small zoo with kangaroos, llamas, swans, deer, etc.

Thiene Bonin Longare
The structure of the palace is based on the characteristic stylistic elements of Palladian buildings, even if it was finally completed by the architect Vincenzo Scamozzi, during the early years of the seventeenth century. The double order of Corinthian columns which ornate the two floors of the facade also repeats the sequence on the rear which faces the wide courtyard and park. Inside, the palace is decorated with fine eighteenth century frescos.

Palazzo Iseppo da Porto
This is an early work of Palladio's, and the plans, along with others, are now in the Burlington collection in London. The elegant structure is divided into three floors: the ground floor wall, in which six windows surmounted by masks open, is faced with light rusticated ashlars work, almost as if to represent the strength necessary to support the elegant piano nobile, in which the succession of windows with balconies, and decorated by tympanums and relief's, is broken by Ionic columns. A high frieze separates the third part of the facade: a windowed attic enlivened by short pilasters and statues.

Palazzo da Monte
The entrance portal, underlined by rusticated ashlars which brusquely interrupt the smooth surface of the wall is contrasted on the piano nobile by an elegant “serliana” - the typical window much used by and named after the architect, Sebastiano Serlio - consisting of an arch flanked by short architraves. The building was very probably planned by the young Palladio, though it was carried out by others in 1581, after the architect's death, as an inscription on the string-course shows.

Palazzo Chiericati
This palazzo, one of Palladio's most original and interesting, was begun in 1550 but work on it continued for a whole century after the architect's death, until towards the end of 1680. The facade of the building is composed of a portico on the ground floor and a piano nobile, the latter consisting of a central block - in which five windows open - and two galleries to the sides. The structure creates a powerful play of chiaroscuro effects and gives a sense of movement to the whole building, accentuating its lightness. Palazzo Chiericati has been the seat of the Pinacoteca Civica since 1855 and conserves various works of great artistic interest in its rich collection.

Palazzo Barbaran
This palace designed by Palladio for Count Montano Barbarano in 1569-70 has been restored to its original splendor by its recent restoration. The foreground is decorated by Ionic demicolumns with the plane behind enlivened by the sequence of Corinthian columns and by magnificent reliefs. Reliefs and stuccoes also enrich the rooms inside to which access is gained through a grandiose atrium with Doric columns. The building is the seat of the Monuments and Fine Arts Office and of the Centro Internazionale di Studi di Architettura dedicated to Palladio.

Palazzo Garzadori
A stylistic analysis of this original and elegant building makes the attribution to Andrea Palladio quite plausible, those it was built by one of his followers. The piano nobile, which rises above two large ground floor portals, has a chiaroscuro effect produced by four pilasters and the openings of four windows, two of which, in the centre, frame a niche housing the statue of Gerolamo Garzadori who commissioned the palazzo. Above these, a tympanum opened to hold the imposing noble coat of arms, removed during the nineteenth century.

http://www.filcoo.com/img/mark.gifPlaces of Interests

Salvi Garden
Opened to the public in 1592, it was arranged in the Italian style with flower-beds in a regular geometric pattern and a maze at the end; in 1826 it was rearranged in the English style. The park is surrounded by a stream known as the Seriola whose waters reflect two fine loggias: the Loggia Palladiana (late 16th century) and the Loggia Longhena (1649), commissioned from the Venetian architect by Gianluigi di Valmarana for the meetings of academicians concerned with philosophical debates and poetry reading.

Querini Park
This is the largest and most attractive park in the town with a broad stretch of green bisected by an avenue lined with eighteenth-century statues; on the left is a thick wood of acacia and plane trees. A wooden bridge leads to a round island where the architect A. Piovene built a charming little temple in 1820. As a background for the park, pine trees and cypresses of Lebanon and the bell-tower and Church of Araceli; Iappelli collaborated in the arrangement of the greenhouses.

Villa Guiccioli Park
The old villa, by the architect G.A. Selva, is the home of the Museum of the Risorgimento and the Resistance; the large garden that surrounds it is now a public park containing some forty plant species. The alternation of lawns and groups of trees, the varied nature of the ground and the absence of symmetry, though in a fairly small area, give the Villa Guiccioli Park the characteristic style of the romantic garden rather like an English landscape garden. A network of gravel-strewn curved paths runs through the park. A plan is being drawn up for using the park for didactic purposes.

http://www.filcoo.com/img/mark.gifEvents

Throughout the year, visitors to Vicenza have a number of opportunities to experience various unique festivals and events held in the city and around the general region of Veneto.

The Patron Saints Day Celebration - 8th of September
Held on the 8th of September every year, The Patron Saints Day Celebration takes over the city of Vicenza. This public holiday celebrates the Virgin Mary of Monte Berico, who was in large part responsible for the city's strong religious roots. During this day, the streets of the city fill with colorful celebrations, which include flowers and traditional dress.

The Carnival - Middle of February
The Carnival in Venice is one of the country's largest celebrations. Venice is located about 65 kilometers east of Vicenza, and is easily reached by using the Fast Train system (the train station is located in the city center). Throughout this festival, thousands of people are treated to live music, colorfully costumed festival goers, and a series of elaborate parades that fill the streets. Carnival is held in many other cities around Italy, but the one in Venice is particularly good.

Vivi Vicenza - Summer, every year
One of the favourite appointments of the inhabitants of Vicenza is the celebration “Vivi Vicenza” that puts together music, dance and cabaret shows during the summer period.

The Human Chess Game
In the nearby village of Marostica there is a very particular event: The Human Chess Game played in a wonderful medieval square. The show, with over 550 characters, last about 2 hours.