The finest of the private villas built along Reggio Emilia’s ring boulevards in the 1920s, designed by the engineer Guido Tirelli for professor Giuseppe Zironi, with roaring lions carved under the eaves and an elephant in the garden fountain.
At a glance
- Type
- Private villa, still in private ownership
- Built
- Completed 1928
- Designed by
- Guido Tirelli (Reggio Emilia 1883 – Barcelona 1940), engineer
- Commissioned by
- Professor Giuseppe Zironi
- Style
- Eclectic, mature-Renaissance revival with Liberty inflections
- Location
- Viale Timavo, corner of via della Racchetta, Reggio Emilia
Overview
Villa Zironi stands on the corner of viale Timavo and via della Racchetta, on the ring of boulevards that replaced Reggio Emilia’s walls. It is a compact three-storey house on a rectangular plan, entered through a two-arch loggia, with a corner tower rising just over seventeen metres to the eaves.
The style is worth stating precisely, because the label often attached to it is too simple. The provincial architectural survey calls it eclectic, with a redundancy of styles and ornament, a variety of marbles and terracottas: Renaissance models and Liberty variations alternate in the composition. It is not a Liberty villa. It is an eclectic one in which Liberty appears as a secondary voice.
History
Guido Tirelli was born in Reggio Emilia in 1883, took a degree in mechanical engineering in Milan in 1906, and from 1907 headed the technical office of the province. In 1923 the Crudo press published his Palazzine e ville signorili, sixty-six designs for single-family houses, which sold across Italy. His clients were the local middle class of merchants and professionals, drawn to eclecticism and unpersuaded by modernism.
Professor Giuseppe Zironi commissioned this house from him, and it was finished in 1928. Tirelli designed everything: the furnishings, the floors, the fixtures, the colours of the materials. The models he drew on ranged from the fortified Tuscan country villa to the mature Renaissance of Roman examples and the Lombard classicism of nineteenth-century bourgeois palazzetti.
After 8 September 1943 the villa was requisitioned by the German Platzkommandantum, the command that administered public life in the occupied city. In 2012 the owner opened the house for Habitants Atypiques, an exhibition of Fotografia Europea on the theme “Vita Comune”: photographs by Alexa Brunet with texts by her sister Irène, the result of four years spent recording people in France who had chosen to live differently, far from the cities, often building their own homes.
What you see
The corner tower carries the building. High-reliefs of roaring lions run beneath the eaves, and at the angles bundles of richly entablatured colonnettes carry the roof. A serliana opens on the viale Timavo front; a semi-hexagonal bow window marks the large dining room on the south side.
In the garden, in front of the main staircase, an enormous stone elephant stands in a fountain peopled with water creatures. The wrought-iron gate is a piece of real quality in its own right. The secondary entrance on via della Racchetta keeps its custodian’s lodge.
Practical information
- This is a private house. There is no public access and no visiting; it can be seen only from the street
- Where: corner of viale Timavo and via della Racchetta, a short walk from Reggio Emilia’s historic centre
- Best seen from: viale Timavo, where the serliana and the corner tower read together
- Not a protected monument: no listing appears in Italy’s national catalogue of cultural property
Sources
- Provincia di Reggio Emilia, 4000 Luoghi, entry on Villa Zironi by arch. Rosaria Petrongari, December 2011 (portal now offline; consulted through the Internet Archive)
- Italy for Movies, the national location portal of the Ministry of Culture, Ministry of Tourism and Cinecittà — entry on Villa Zironi
- Biblioteca Panizzi, Comune di Reggio Emilia — Archivio di Guido Tirelli among the architecture holdings
- Istituti Storici dell’Emilia-Romagna, with Regione Emilia-Romagna, mapping of the occupation of Reggio Emilia (Villa Zironi as Platzkommandantur)
- Fondazione Palazzo Magnani, Fotografia Europea 2012, exhibition page for Habitants Atypiques (archived)
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the history of Villa Zironi?
The house was designed by the engineer Guido Tirelli (Reggio Emilia 1883 – Barcelona 1940) for professor Giuseppe Zironi and completed in 1928, on the ring of boulevards that replaced the city walls. Tirelli designed everything down to the furnishings, the floors and the colours of the materials. After 8 September 1943 the villa was requisitioned by the German Platzkommandantur, the command that administered public life in the occupied city.
Who owns Villa Zironi?
It remains a private house in private ownership, and we do not publish the name of the family that lives there. The man who commissioned it was professor Giuseppe Zironi. In 2012 the owner opened the house for Habitants Atypiques, an exhibition of Fotografia Europea.
Can you visit Villa Zironi in Reggio Emilia?
No. There is no public access and no visiting: the villa can be seen only from the street, at the corner of viale Timavo and via della Racchetta, a short walk from the historic centre. It reads best from viale Timavo, where the serliana and the corner tower are seen together.
Is Villa Zironi a Liberty villa?
Not properly. The provincial architectural survey calls it eclectic, with a redundancy of styles and ornament and a variety of marbles and terracottas, in which Renaissance models and Liberty variations alternate. Liberty is a secondary voice in it, not the key.
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