Colonia Novarese
A 117-metre concrete ship run aground at Miramare: Giuseppe Peverelli’s 1934 colony is one of the boldest Rationalist buildings on the Adriatic.
At a glance
The Colonia Novarese lies on the Miramare seafront, a few hundred metres from the brick pavilions of the Bolognese colony but a world away in style. The Turin engineer Giuseppe Peverelli built it in 1934 for the Fascist federation of Novara, and he built it fast — in about four months. He gave it the shape of a ship: a single block about 117 metres long and 18 wide, its ends rounded like a prow and a stern, raised over the sand on the logic of the ocean liner. Disused since the 1970s, it is now a haunting Rationalist relic.
Key facts
- Built: 1934, in about four months
- Engineer: Giuseppe Peverelli (Turin)
- Promoter: the Fascist federation of Novara (“Colonia dei Fasci di Novara”)
- Form: a ship-shaped block, about 117 m long and 18 m wide
- Capacity: around 1,000 children plus some 200 staff
- Status: disused since 1975; long entrusted to Riminiterme
- Coordinates: 44.026151, 12.627356 — Google Maps
History
By the 1930s the Adriatic shore between Rimini and Riccione had become a coast of colonies: vast institutions where the Fascist regime sent working-class children for summers of sea air and discipline. Provinces and party federations competed to build the most modern. Novara’s federation turned to Giuseppe Peverelli, an engineer trained in Turin, and asked for something emphatically of its time.
Peverelli answered with Rationalism — the hard, machine-minded language then radiating from Turin, where the Lingotto factory had shown what reinforced concrete could do. He stretched the colony into a single long bar and rounded its ends, so that the whole building reads as a liner beached on the sand: an image of the sea written into a building meant for the sea.
The colony outlived the regime but not the century of tourism that overtook it. Empty since 1975 and long entrusted to Riminiterme, it has become one of the most photographed ruins of the coast and a recurring cause in the FAI’s “Luoghi del Cuore” campaigns for its rescue.
What you see
From the seafront the Novarese is unmistakable: a long, pale spine of concrete with curved ends, lifted clear of the ground and banded with horizontal windows. There is no ornament. The drama is all in the form — the ship metaphor carried at the scale of a building 117 metres long.
Closer, the decay is its own subject. Stripped interiors, broken glass and salt-bleached concrete have made the Novarese a landmark of urban exploration, even as its bones still state the Rationalist case as clearly as the day it opened.
Practical information
- The colony is disused and unsafe; treat it strictly as an exterior, seen from the public seafront.
- Do not enter the building or fenced areas — the structure is derelict.
- Pair it with the nearby Colonia Bolognese for a short tour of the Miramare colonies.
Getting there
Miramare is the southern seafront district of Rimini. The local stop Rimini Miramare sits on the Bologna–Ancona line, with Federico Fellini International Airport alongside. From central Rimini the seafront and the coast road both run south to Miramare in a few minutes.
Nearby
- Colonia Marina Bolognese — the brick pavilion colony a short way along the same beach
- Grand Hotel Rimini — the Liberty landmark of the city’s seafront
- The Rationalist colonie of Riccione: Bertazzoni, ex Colonia Reggiana and Colonia Dalmine
Sources
- Rimini Turismo — Colonia Novarese (architettura moderna)
- FAI — I Luoghi del Cuore, Colonia Novarese
- Ferruccio Canali, “La colonia Novarese di Giuseppe Peverelli a Miramare di Rimini (1934)” (academic study)
Find it on the map
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