Villa Borghese: The Museum Park

It all began in a vineyard
It's considered the city's most important green space. Painted by famous artists, the muse and inspiration of writers and celebrated musicians, Villa Borghese is perhaps Rome's best known 'villa', or park. Unique in the world for its concentration of cultural institutions, the park contains five museums and is ringed by a string of foreign academies representing Romania, Egypt, Sweden, Denmark, Austria and Britain. Villa Borghese stretches across 80 hectares, including the Pincio area.

It's history began in 1580 with the planting of a modest vineyard. In the early 1600s Cardinal Scipione Caffarelli Borghese, favoured nephew of Pope Paul V, decided to acquire the surrounding land to create a "pleasure palace". Villa Borghese has now regained its ancient splendour. Recent work - some 20 building projects - have highlighted both its artistic and environmental value, restoring it to how it originally looked in the 16th century.

The Piazzale Flaminio entrance, the Pinciana Gate, Lions Gate, the Piazzale delle Canestre and the temple of Antonio and Faustina have all been restored. Rome authorities have called it the "Park of Museums" and dubbed it the city's cultural cornerstone. It's wide variety of plants have also been taken into account. The Valley of Plantains, also known as the Valley of Dogs, still contains some 400 different species.

The "Casina delle Rose" (House of Roses) has been earmarked to become the museum of the Villa Borghese park. Restoration plans intend it to be used to house 150 marble statues taken from the park and replaced with plaster copies. A park information and document centre will be installed in the 'Giardino della Meridiana' building and leaflets on the park will be distributed throughout the city's tourist information points (PIT).

Secret Gardens: Bulbs were removed to make way for pineapples
Old Dutch tulips, citrus fruits, carnations, lichens, roses, sunflowers and peppers, ancient and exotic plants introduced in the 1500s and used to adorn crowns and floral displays. Anemones, narcissi and hyacinths followed. The three secret gardens have been brought back to life and can once again be visited.
The gardens were laid out according to prevailing fashion. Historically, this part of the villa functioned as an archive of plants used and introduced over the centuries. For example, the "bulb garden" that took pride of place in the villa during the 1600s, was replaced with a garden of pineapples when this thoroughly American plant became all the rage.

Originally there were three gardens: the "Old Garden", the "Bird Cage Garden" and the "Meridiana". The first two were planted in during the early decades of the 1600s, along with the main house, the "Casino nobile"'. the third dates to 1680. All were destroyed during the second world war when they were turned into "war gardens" for the production of cabbages and potatoes.

Free guided tours, available to the public hourly between 10 am and 1 pm and 3 pm and 6 pm, have been organised by the city council's environment and farm department,
tel. +39 06770042 or 067004573.

The Lake and Deer Park: for romance
or hunting?
There can hardly be a more romantic spot for taking a stroll. The "Lake Garden" was used to site the Borghese family's historic collection of ancient art. Followng restoration, the historic tree-lined walkways are open once more, complete with new lawns and flowerbeds, a landscape of trees, shrubs and herbaceous borders. The lake is framed by an English-style cast-iron pergola, just as it was at the beginning of the 1900s. Delightful rockeries of tufa rock line the banks of the old stream that feeds the lake.

The "Deer Park" has also been given new life, with restorers removing the asphalt from its paths and avenues. The area where deer and other animals were once fenced in for hunting has also been reconstructed.