Experience Sicily

Category: Architecture

  • The Marquis Would Be Pleased 

    The Palazzo Lungarini was recently restored. Located in Palermo’s historic center on Via Lungarini, it was built in 1625 for the Marquis of Lungarini Bonanno. 

  • Palermo’s Foro Italico

    Once called the Marina, the Foro Italico is Palermo’s communal seafront. After being neglected and inaccessible for years after World War II, today, the long public park is where Palermitani take walks, play soccer, ride bicycles, and bask in the sun. It’s also where large-scale events like the fireworks during Il Festino, the city-wide party…

  • Another Door Opens

    Doorway at the Arab-Norman UNESCO designated San Giovanni degli Eremiti church in Palermo

  • One with the Tiles

    Here I am, one with the tiles of Caltagirone’s Staircase of Santa Maria del Monte, which was built in 1609 to connect the old lower town to the new upper town. Since 1954, each of its 142 steps was decorated with a unique design of colorful, handcrafted majolica ceramic tile, a craft for which the…

  • A Genius Feat 

    If you are into art, architecture, and ceramics, Le Stanze al Genio (The Rooms to the Genius) is for you. This home-museum features a collection of majolica ceramic floor tiles sporting designs from Naples and Sicily that were produced from the end of the 16th century to the beginning of the 20th century. You must…

  • Old Woman Winter 

    At the busy intersection of Corso Vittorio Emanuele and Via Maqueda, in Palermo’s historic center, sits Quattro Canti–four corners. The crossroads is flanked by four 18th century Baroque facades, each with a series of statues: At the top, the city’s patron saints prior to Santa Rosalia; in the middle, the Spanish kings of Sicily; and…

  • A Room with a Balcony 

    Balcony, the village of Castelmola, above Taormina 

  • Palermo’s (In)famous Fountain

    This (in)famous fountain that dominates Palermo’s Piazza Pretoria was originally designed and constructed in 1554-55 by Florentine sculptor Francesco Camilliani for the garden of a Tuscan villa. Purchased and augmented by the city of Palermo in 1573, government officials placed it in front of the Palazzo Pretorio, the city’s principal municipal building, with pride. However,…

  • Walk into the Light Vincent

    In honor of my friend Vincent Titone, the president/chief-organizer of the New York Sicilian Meet-Up group who was laid to rest today, I post a photo of the apse of his favorite church in Sicily, Monreale Cathedral. Christ Pantocrator, the Savor, dominates the temple and gives his blessing in the Greek style: “I am the…