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Published: June 14th 2017
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Geo: 45.5459, 11.5403
Up early the next morning – Elio's cousin Maria Teresa and her husband Valerio were driving from Milan to catch up with us, and had agreed to meet us in Vicenza (about half way from Milan). We arrived in the city to find some sort of bike race which involved the same guys going round and round the old city, blocking access – but fortune shined on us again and we got a great free park close to the city gates, and made our way in.
Vicenza is famous as the city of Palladio (the famous architect) and is absolutely packed with Palladio-designed buildings, or buildings designed by his students and followers. We walked up the Via Palladio, past many lovely palazzi, (and many lovely dress shops!) and went across to the Piazza dei Signori to see the Basilica Palladio (not a church at all, but a wonderful town hall given a great new façade by Palladio in the mid 1500s.) Unfortunately, I'd noted from my guide book that the Basilica fronts two piazzas – couldn't have known that the Piazza Erbe would be under significant renovations and therefore I shouldn't have chosen it to meet Elio's cousin, but we
still found them very quickly, and introductions to us and the kids were made over the world's slowest cup of coffee in the more picturesque piazza! The boys loved running madly in the Piazza, and trying to climb the columns at the end of the piazza.
Then, with the Milan cousins in tow (they had never been to Vicenza), we headed off down the pretty streets to the Teatro Olympico. Whilst this is acclaimed as a Palladian masterpiece, in truth, he died before it was built, but he did contribute to the plans. The Teatro is the oldest indoor theatre in Europe, and is a masterpiece of architecture, particularly for the set designs of the Teatro. The onstage scenery, designed by Vincenzo Scamozzi to give the appearance of long streets receding to a distant horizon, was installed in 1585 for the very first performance held in the theatre, and is the oldest surviving stage set still in existence. It is amazing – the set is designed to be steeply sloped, so that you think that the streets are long – it is a brilliant exercise in perspective, and it really helped the kids that we had seen the guy from Grand
Designs walking around the set (something that the public cannot do) to show how it is really an optical illusion. It was just wonderful! Then, we detoured through the city museum – a nice size for the kids, as in one hour, they could see a few rooms of caveman things, Roman things, medieval things etc. rather than spend half the day looking at these things.
Then, back to the Piazza for lunch – we found a great restaurant, right on the square, serving meals fancy enough for the Italians but also pizza for the kids (and Steven and I). As the younger members of our group finished eating, we went for a walk down more cute streets with Palladian palazzi, and returned for a coffee and to say farewell to Maria Teresa and Valerio. We did stop in at the church of the Sacred Corona (where there is a famous piece of art, and a piece of wood from the Thorn of Crowns) but it was under major renovations. Then, we had a gentle walk back to the car, and my wonderful husband agreed to drive us past La Rotonda – a villa which is another Palladian masterpiece. It was
open to the public, but we figured that the seven of us were rather hot and tired, and wouldn't get the full benefit – something to come back for next time.v
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