ITALIAN GARDENS

ITALIAN GARDENS
Traditional Italian gardens are formal in design, with symmetrical, geometric beds and garden
“rooms” delineated by hedges and walls.

Plants are less important for their colour value than as design elements, such as for clipped topiary.
Flowers are few.

Water, statuary, private spaces and a promenade or formal pathway are all elements that contribute
to the Italian garden.
 Geographical conditions
• Italy is located in southern Europe and comprises the long,
boot-shaped Italian Peninsula.

• Summer is usually more stable, the northern regions often

have thunderstorms in the afternoon/night hours and some
grey and rainy days.

• Spring and Autumn weather can be very changeable, with

sunny and warm weeks (sometimes with Summer-like
temperatures) suddenly broken off by cold spells or followed
by rainy and cloudy weeks.
• The flora was traditionally estimated to comprise about 5,500 vascular plant species.
• Vascular plants include the clubmosses, horsetails, ferns, gymnosperms (including conifers)
and angiosperms (flowering plants).

clubmosses horsetails ferns conifers

 HISTORY( since 13 century) th

• Italian gardens had two phases.

1. Italian medieval gardens
2. Italian renaissance gardens
• The Italian medieval gardens had a wall between the house and the landscape are, and there were
vegetables and shrubs grown along the periphery. It was very silent meditation and prayers. It has
no element of focus in these gardens
• But later the Italian renaissance gardens broke down the walls between the garden and the house
and spread out as a single element.
• The Italian Renaissance garden was a new style of garden which emerged in the late 15th century
at villas in Rome and Florence.
• These gardens much more larger, grandeur and followed extreme symmetry in the design.
• They were filled with statues, fountains, grottoes, water bodies and other elements to attract and
impress the visitors.
 ORIGIN
• Italian Garden Architecture is another style that evolved after the Persian Gardening Style… This
added another element of interest in the “Development of the Modern Garden Architecture”.

Italian gardens are characterized by the abundance of architectural features or built features in the
garden.
• Staircases
• balustrades
• cascades pavilions and pavements
• statues in niche
• fountains
• even the cypress avenues are imitations of colonnades.

The origins of the style are to be found in ancient Rome. They took the pains to site their villas on the
countryside with exceptional views, where cooling breeze would reach them above malarial valleys.
Within the villas there were courts and colonnades designed for every phase of wind and weather.
 Villa Medici
The most revolutionary garden was the Villa Medici built in 1460 at Fiesole. The garden was enclosed with grottos,
statues along a linear axis.The full-fledged renaissance garden first emerged as a prelude to building St. Peters.
 Cortile del Belvedere
Pope Julius II commissioned Bramante, who was later to draw up the plans for the Basilica., to build the Vatican Gardens – and
build was the word. The Cortile del Belvedere at the Vatican became the prototype for imaginative roofless architecture.
 Bramante’s successors, Ligoria and Vignola brought the Italian garden to its climax with their masterpieces of mid
16th century – The Villa d’Este at Tivoli and the Villa Farnese at Caprarola and the Villa Lante (1566) near Viterbo.

The Villa d’Este at Tivoli

the Villa Farnese at Caprarola
Villa Lante (1566) near Viterbo
 Features Of Italian Gardens

DESIGN

• Symmetry is paramount in Italian gardens.

• Beds, or parterres, are shaped geometrically in squares, rectangles or triangles.
• Because many Italian gardens are on hillsides, they are laid out on several levels, or
terraces, offering places to stand and enjoy the surrounding view as well as see the
garden from above.
• Order and balance are the design goals, illustrating man’s power over nature.
PROMENADE/public walk /pavement

• The promenade is a wide, usually raised, pathway flanked by formally clipped hedges where a family
or visitors may stroll to view the garden.
• Its purpose is both for seeing and being seen, and it provides a stage from which the owner can
survey his holdings.
• Hardscape -- stone walkways,
• patios and walls -- is a signature element of the Italian garden, rather than expansive lawns.
SECRET GARDEN AND GROTTO
• A hideaway in the garden that might contain a vine-draped pergola or just a tucked-away bench
provides an intimate getaway space.
• Often an Italian garden includes a grotto - an artificial cave filled with sculpture and furnishings where
one can sip wine in a refreshingly cool space.
WATER
• The sound and cooling effects of water are essential elements of the Italian garden, whether from
bubbling fountains, pools or cascades.
• Often, an ornate stone fountain shooting arcs of water forms the focal point of the garden.
STATUARY AND STONEWARE
• The garden is considered an extension of the entertainment area of the home, so it is
decorated in the same manner, with plenty of art. Sculptures of gods, goddesses and heroes
of ancient legends are common.
• Lemon trees, potted in stone urns, are a favourite decoration for the seating areas.
PLANTS
• Traditional Italian gardens have few flowers.
• The plants are mainly evergreens, manicured into geometric hedges or topiaries.
• Italian cypress boxwoods and junipers are some of the plants commonly used to form living
walls and delineate different parts of the garden.
• Other green plants are massed within the borders of the geometric beds.
• Italians also like to cover stone walls with trellised foliage vines or climbing roses.

Cypress plants
VILLA LANTE
PLAN
• The Quadrato is a perfectly square. The twin casini stand on one side, on the
remaining three sides the garden is enclosed by high box hedges.

• At the heart of the complex, a centre basin contains the "Fontana dei Mori"
Central Moorish fountain
 In the first of the ascending terraces, lodged between two stone staircases, is the
Fontana dei Lumini ("Fountain of the Lamps"), a circular tiered fountain; on the ledge of each tier,
smaller fountains, imitating Roman oil lamps, spout small jets of water which in the sunlight
appear to blaze like lamp flames.
The water organ
On the next (third) terrace is a large and long stone table, with a central channel with
water flowing to keep the wine cool.
At the back of this terrace, are large sculpted river gods flanking a fountain.
Banquet table
Fountain of giants
Directly above and supplying the water for the fountain is the chain of water, a water
feature (gioco d'acqua)

This rill of small basins allows the water to ripple down to arrive at the fountain
between the sculpted crayfish claws.In the meantime, stairs flanking the lead up to
the next terrace.
Water chain
Dolphin fountain
 Fountain of flood

Grotto fountain
THANK YOU
Presentation By:
Alekhya.P
Anurag.G
Jaya.U
Neha
Niharika Reddy