The name Italy assigned to the historic nineteenth-century Villa is a dedication to a loved woman. Arrigo Olivieri, a leading figure in the beer industry, in 1919 bought the Villa and gave it the name of his beloved, Italy. He also chose to dedicate the name of a well-known Paduan beer to the Birra Itala Pilsen which he himself began producing in 1916. The historic Itala Pilsen brand is still a strong point of the Peroni Group, owner of the brand that continues successfully to produce the well-known blonde drink in Padua.
From the marriage with Italy two daughters are born, one of whom will marry the Count of Panigai, son of the princess of Porcia, an ancient noble family from Friuli. Villa Italia was built between 1810 and 1828, at least as far as can be deduced from the reading of the historical land registers. In fact, it does not appear in the Napoleonic land register of 1810, while in the Austrian one only the housing body is present; in the Austro-Italian cadastre we also find the annex, used as a stable and then transformed into a garage.
The building is inserted in a large Italian-designed park, with statues, a large fountain and flower beds built near the complex, and open to the countryside now a vast golf course. The Villa is made up of two bodies: a central volume, set on a roughly tripartite plan in the Venetian style, raised in three floors, an annex on the left compared to the main front of only two floors, on the right a body adjacent to a single floor, always as deep as the main building but occupying the width of a single room, it connects the body used as a dwelling to the portico of the stables. This volume has a three-pitched roof and was also remodeled in 1934.
Villa Italia
Address: Via S. Marco, 51, 35129
Phone: 049 807 7520
Site:
https://www.villaitaliapadova.it/Location inserted by
Culturalword Abco