Palazzo degli Uffici (EUR)
The first permanent building of the EUR quarter, raised in under two years by Gaetano Minnucci as the working headquarters for the exhibition that the war would cancel.
At a glance
The Palazzo degli Uffici stands at Largo Virgilio Testa, on the northern edge of Rome’s EUR district. Gaetano Minnucci designed it in 1937 as the office building of the authority planning the 1942 Universal Exhibition, and it was finished in 1939 — the first structure of the new quarter to be completed. Its clean travertine mass, symmetrical loggia and near-total absence of ornament make it a textbook example of the simplified classicism, or monumentalism, that shaped Italian state architecture in the late 1930s. The inscription running along the upper facade still names its first owner: the Ente Autonomo Esposizione Universale di Roma.
Key facts
- Architect: Gaetano Minnucci (commission awarded 25 October 1937).
- Built: begun December 1937, completed 1939 — the first permanent building of EUR.
- Coordination: part of the E42 master plan directed by Marcello Piacentini.
- Style: simplified neoclassicism / monumentalism (stripped classicism).
- Original use: offices of the Ente Autonomo Esposizione Universale di Roma.
- Notable feature: Publio Morbiducci’s bas-relief over the main entrance, The History of Rome Through Building Works.
History
In 1936 the regime decided to hold a Universal Exhibition in Rome in 1942, on a new site south of the city that would afterwards remain as a permanent district. The planning body, the Ente Autonomo Esposizione Universale di Roma, needed a headquarters before anything else could be built. Gaetano Minnucci received the commission on 25 October 1937; work started that December and the building was ready in 1939. It was the first permanent construction of the whole EUR quarter.
Minnucci worked within the general plan coordinated by Marcello Piacentini, who oversaw the architecture of the exhibition as a whole. The Exposition itself never opened: the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939 and Italy’s entry in 1940 halted the project, and the half-built quarter was completed only in the 1950s. The Palazzo degli Uffici, already finished, survived the interruption intact and has served as an office building ever since.
Beneath the palazzo lies an air-raid shelter built for Benito Mussolini, one of several bunkers prepared for him in Rome; it is preserved and has been opened to guided visits in recent years, adding a second, hidden layer to the building’s history.
What you see
The main front is a broad rectangular block clad in travertine, organised around a ground-floor loggia of square pillars that runs the width of the building. Above it, small regular windows punctuate an almost blank wall, and the upper edge carries the incised inscription of the exhibition authority. There is no applied ornament in the classical sense — no capitals, cornices or carved friezes — only the rhythm of the openings and the pale, even surface of the stone. Two stone lions flank the central axis.
The one concentrated point of decoration is the entrance, where Publio Morbiducci’s large travertine bas-relief, The History of Rome Through Building Works, condenses the city’s history into a single carved panel. It is the kind of controlled, monumental relief typical of the EUR buildings: figurative, but flattened and stylised to match the sober architecture around it.
Practical information
- Access: the building is an active office and is normally seen from the outside; the exterior and its bas-relief are visible at any time.
- Air-raid shelter: the underground bunker is occasionally open for guided tours — check current availability before visiting.
- Time needed: 15–20 minutes for the exterior, as part of a wider EUR walk.
- Best combined with: the nearby Palazzo della Civiltà Italiana and the other EUR landmarks.
Getting there
The Palazzo degli Uffici is in the EUR district in the south of Rome, easily reached on metro line B (stations EUR Magliana, EUR Fermi or EUR Palasport, each a short walk away). By car it sits near Largo Virgilio Testa; the whole quarter is walkable, and the building is a natural first stop coming from the northern edge of EUR.
Coordinates: 41.8369, 12.4685 — open in Google Maps.
Nearby
- EUR (E42) Rationalist Walk — the curated itinerary with map and GPX
- EUR, 1937–1954: Walking the Quarter of the Exposition That Never Opened — by Stefano Vigolo
- Palazzo della Civiltà Italiana — the “Square Colosseum”, the emblem of EUR.
- Palazzo dei Congressi — Adalberto Libera’s congress hall on the opposite side of the quarter.
Sources
- Archivio degli architetti italiani del Novecento (SAN, Ministero della Cultura) — Palazzo degli Uffici, EUR, Gaetano Minnucci, 1939.
- EUR S.p.A. — Palazzo Uffici, historic-buildings section (eurspa.it).
- Wikimedia Commons — file description and category for the Palazzo degli Uffici (EUR, Rome).
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