Description
The Palazzo Reale of Genoa is the most sumptuous of the palaces on Via Balbi: a Baroque royal palace that has kept its interiors intact, with frescoes, stuccoes, mirrors, furniture and furnishings from three centuries. It is one of the Palazzi dei Rolli, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The jewel is the Hall of Mirrors, commissioned by Gerolamo Durazzo and painted by Domenico Parodi, which blends painting, sculpture and architecture in a display of power and wealth worthy of the great galleries of Rome and Versailles.
Among the mirrors stand ancient Roman statues and four marbles by Filippo Parodi, Domenico's father, inspired by Ovid's Metamorphoses. At the far end is Francesco Maria Schiaffino's Rape of Proserpina, which reinterprets Bernini's famous group with Rococo verve.
The vault tells a little moral lesson: Venus, Bacchus and Apollo are the vices that brought down the empires of antiquity, recalled in the medallions by four fallen rulers. On the cornice, by contrast, sit the Virtues, who guide the Durazzo family, whose coat of arms stands out in the centre.
On the piano nobile you pass through the Throne Room, the Audience Hall and the Ballroom, redone in 1842 by the set designer Michele Canzio for the wedding of Victor Emmanuel II and Maria Adelaide. Before them come the large 17th-century frescoes, such as Valerio Castello's Fame of the Balbi.
Outside, the hanging garden looks out over the port. It is paved in risseu, the Ligurian mosaic of black and white sea pebbles, which comes from a demolished monastery. It was created, together with the courtyard and the new staircases, by the architect Carlo Fontana in the early 18th century.
The palace was built between 1643 and 1650 for the Balbi, the family who built the whole street. In 1677 it passed to the Durazzo, who lengthened the façade from thirty to almost a hundred metres and hosted Emperor Joseph II and Napoleon here.
In 1824 the Savoys bought it and made it their summer residence. They sent some masterpieces of the Durazzo collection off to Turin, including Veronese's Supper in the House of Simon, replaced by a copy despite the protests of the Genoese: the room is still called the Veronese Room.
The palace also holds the Teatro del Falcone, which hosted Carlo Goldoni in 1763: wrecked by wartime bombs, it was rebuilt from scratch after the war.
The jewel is the Hall of Mirrors, commissioned by Gerolamo Durazzo and painted by Domenico Parodi, which blends painting, sculpture and architecture in a display of power and wealth worthy of the great galleries of Rome and Versailles.
Among the mirrors stand ancient Roman statues and four marbles by Filippo Parodi, Domenico's father, inspired by Ovid's Metamorphoses. At the far end is Francesco Maria Schiaffino's Rape of Proserpina, which reinterprets Bernini's famous group with Rococo verve.
The vault tells a little moral lesson: Venus, Bacchus and Apollo are the vices that brought down the empires of antiquity, recalled in the medallions by four fallen rulers. On the cornice, by contrast, sit the Virtues, who guide the Durazzo family, whose coat of arms stands out in the centre.
On the piano nobile you pass through the Throne Room, the Audience Hall and the Ballroom, redone in 1842 by the set designer Michele Canzio for the wedding of Victor Emmanuel II and Maria Adelaide. Before them come the large 17th-century frescoes, such as Valerio Castello's Fame of the Balbi.
Outside, the hanging garden looks out over the port. It is paved in risseu, the Ligurian mosaic of black and white sea pebbles, which comes from a demolished monastery. It was created, together with the courtyard and the new staircases, by the architect Carlo Fontana in the early 18th century.
The palace was built between 1643 and 1650 for the Balbi, the family who built the whole street. In 1677 it passed to the Durazzo, who lengthened the façade from thirty to almost a hundred metres and hosted Emperor Joseph II and Napoleon here.
In 1824 the Savoys bought it and made it their summer residence. They sent some masterpieces of the Durazzo collection off to Turin, including Veronese's Supper in the House of Simon, replaced by a copy despite the protests of the Genoese: the room is still called the Veronese Room.
The palace also holds the Teatro del Falcone, which hosted Carlo Goldoni in 1763: wrecked by wartime bombs, it was rebuilt from scratch after the war.