During an extended research before our trip to Modena, I was browsing through the map, trying to figure out the best locations for our experience, when a certain village caught my eye.

Twenty kilometers southeast from Modena lies Vignola, the birth place of the Barozzi cake and Giacomo Barozzi da Vignola, the famous Italian mannerist architect, an author of highly praised book on classical architecture from 1562; the Canon of the Five Orders of Architecture (Regola delli cinque ordini d’architettura).

Together with Serlio and Palladio, Vignola spread the Italian Renaissance style throughout Western Europe.

Born at the very beginning of 16^th century, Giacomo Barozzi began his career as an architect in Bologna, supporting himself by painting and making perspective templates for inlay craftsmen. At the age of 29, Barozzi started traveling for the education and ended up in France at one point as well, where he met some of the contemporary architects and artists like the architect Sebastiano Serlio and the painter Primaticcio. After return to Italy he did some work in Bologna before he moved to Rome where he worked for the Pope Julius III. Soon after his death he was employed by the papal family of the Farnese and he also worked with Michelangelo, who deeply influenced his style.

Some of his finest works are Villa Giulia in Rome, Villa Farnese at Caprarola and Chiesa del Gesù  in Rome.

In his home town of village Vignola, Giacomo, worked on an elegant Renaissance palace left completely intact, the Palazzo Contrari-Boncompagni.

The palazzo was build between the early 1560s and 1567, on order of Ercole Contrari the Elder, a feudatory of Vignola, by the “master mason” Bartolomeo Tristano of Ferrara, but on the Barozzi’s design, therefore the building is known as Palazzo Barozzi.

Successors to the Contrari family in the Vignolese Marquisate were the Boncompagnis, who remained owners of the palace until 1949, when it was purchased by the Parish of Vignola.

In the following years, the palazzo was a home to numerous locals who went homeless after the WWII destruction. Each of the family would live in one of the rooms and they would share the space.

When they were finally housed in separated houses, the palazzo was inhabited by pigeons and left to ruin. The semi-interred basement, which once housed the wine cellars, the kitchen, two wells, the oven and the first cycle of Barozzi’s self-supporting, helical staircase, have all been recently restored and are now open for visitors and the volunteers historians and art lovers, are guiding tours for a price of 2 euros.

Our groups of three was slightly late for a presentation by signor Franco who guides two more people for an evening visit to abandoned and decaying palazzo with the most beautiful staircase that I have ever seen.

The basement and the raised ground floor were intended for kitchens, for stocking supplies and everyday business of housekeeping while the main floor was the part where the fiefdom lived and received their guests and subjects. The attic was the place intended for the accommodation of the servants.

The spiral staircase is the only vertical section that connects the various floors of the building. Supported by a single column, located in the beautiful basement, with self-supported embedded steps.

The steps number 106 and the total height of the staircase is 12.33 meters. They were all decorated and painted by the Modenese painters Fermo Forti and Angelo Forghieri in tempera with geometric squares and grotesque decorations, very popular in the Renaissance era.

Pretty impressive and gorgeous! Just as the cake dedicated to the creator of these stairs.

In 1886, a local pastry chef Eugenio Gollini, created the dark cake (torta nera) made of dark chocolate, almonds and peanuts, eggs, butter and sugar. No flour at all 🙂 Few decades later, in 1907, celebrating 400 years of Vignola’s birth, Gollini decided to dedicate his torta to the famous son of Vignola; Giacomo Barozzi. The rest is history. And it’s a delicious one!

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VIGNOLA

Dok sam istraživala okolicu Modene, prije putovanja, rovala sam po razno raznim člancima i gugl karti s namjerom da nađem zanimljiva mjesta za posjetiti.

Tako sam nabasala i na selo Vignola poznato po nastanku slavne Barozzi torte, ali tek dugotrajnim čačkanjem shvatila sam da mi je samo ime sela vrlo poznato. Sve dok se nisam sjetila studija i renesansne arhitekture.

Dvadeset kilometara jugoistočno od Modene nalazi se rodno mjesto manirističkog arhitekta Giacoma Barozzija od Vignole. Isti je također autor traktata o arhitekturi, Pet redova arhitekture, koji smo tepli na faksu. Skupa sa Serliom i, mojim omiljenim, Palladijem utjecao je na širenje klasičnog talijanskog renesansnog stila u arhitekturi diljem zapadne Europe.

Rođen početkom 16. stoljeća, Giacomo Barozzi, započeo je karijeru kao arhitekt u Bolonji, zarađujući kao slikar te izrađujući predloške za izvedbu perspektive. U dobi od 29 godina, Barozzi je krenuo putovati radi edukacije i tako  završio u Francuskoj gdje je susreo neke od suvremenika; arhitekta Serlija i slikara Primaticcia. Nakon povratka u Italiju, radio je nešto sitno u Bolonji prije nego što je otputovao za Rim gdje ga je uposlio papa Julije III. Nakon papinske smrti, Barozzi je krenuo raditi za cijelu papinsku obitelj Farnese te skupa s Mikijemangelom, koji je imao veliko utjecaja na njegov stil.

Neka od Barozzijevih poznatijih djela su Villa Giulia u Romu, Villa Farnese u Capraroli i Isusovačka crkva u Rimu.

U rodnom mjestu, Giacomo, je radio na elegantnoj renesansnoj palači Contrari-Boncompagni koja je do dana današnjeg ostala kompletno morfološki netaknuta.

Palača je građena između 1560ih i 1567, prema narudžbi Hektora Contrarija Starijeg, veleposjednika iz Vignole. Izvođač radova bio je Bartolomeo Tristano iz Ferrare koji je radio prema Barozzijevim nacrtima, stoga je palača poznata i kao Palača Barozzi.

Nasljednici obitelji Contrari bili su Boncompagnijevi koji su ostali službeni vlasnici do 1949., kad je palaču preuzela župa.

Narednih godina palača je bila dom brojnim obiteljima čije su kuće stradale za vrijeme bombardiranju u Drugom svjetskom ratu. Svaka od obitelji živjela je u jednoj od brojnih soba palače.

Kad su se lokalci konačno skućili, palača je prepuštena golubovima i zubu vremena. Nedavno obnovljen polupodrum, u kojem se nekad čuvalo vino, podrum, kuhinja, dva bunara, peć te Barozzijevo stepenište postali su atrakcija ovog malog mjesta i glavni cilj brojnih znatiželjnika. Lokalni volonteri, povjesničari i ljubitelji umjetnosti i arhitekture, vode dnevne ture za bijedna dva eura, koja smo i mi odvojili te se pridružili Franku koji je već na talijanskom vodio jedan par. Franko je znao nešto engleskog, ja znam nešto talijanskog, skužili smo se 🙂

Ali najbitnije je bilo oku vidljivo:

Spiralno stepenište što se proteže kroz sva četiri kata, od podruma gdje je bilo skladište, prvog kata s kuhinjom, piano nobilea gdje je vlastodržac živio i primao goste te tavana gdje je živjela posluga.

Stošest stepenica ukupne visine 12.33 metara kružno se pruža i oslanja jedno na drugo oko stupa, koji započinje u podrumu.

Slikari Fermo Forti i Angelo Forghieri oslikali su cijelo stubište geometrijskim uzorcima i grotesknim dekoracijama, vrlo popularnim u vrijeme renesanse.

Vrlo impresivno i predivno! Baš poput torte koja je nazvana po autoru ovog stubišta.

1886. lokalni slastičar po imenu Eugenio Gollini, osmislio je crnu tortu od samo šest sastojaka; tamne čokolade, badema i kikirikija, jaja, maslaca i šećera. Bez brašna. Gluten free prije ove glutenske pomame 🙂 Nekoliko godina kasnije, 1907., na 400. godišnjicu Vignolinog rođenja, Gollini je tortu preimenovao u Barozzi tortu, u čast svog slavnog sunarodnjaka.

Ostalo je povijest! I to jako ukusna!