Palladian villas Foscari La Malcontenta Emo Barbaro UNESCO World Heritage

Palladian villas Foscari La Malcontenta Emo Barbaro UNESCO World Heritage

This day excursion is to visit 3 masterpieces of the most important Venetian architect of the Renaissance: Andrea Palladio. The tour is focused on 3 villas that are included in the UNESCO World Heritage list and they can be visited today.

Itinerary
This is a typical itinerary for this product

Stop At: La Malcontenta, Via Dei Turisti 9 Malcontenta di Mira, 30034, Mira Italy

After about 20 minutes driving distance, you will stop to visit Villa Foscari La Malcontenta, the only one built by Andrea Palladio along the Brenta canal Between Venice and Padua. Villa Foscari was built to the brothers Nicolò and Alvise Foscari at the end of the 1550s and rises in an isolate block with no agriculture annexes, not far from the edge of the lagoon of Venice and along the banks of the Brenta riviera.

Duration: 1 hour

Stop At: Villa Cornaro, Via Roma 35, 35017, Piombino Dese Italy

Your tour will continue along back roads, driving by villages and cultivated countryside of the region. After 30 minutes driving distance you will have a coffee break in a village where you will discover another villa by Palladio reported in the UNESCO World Heritage List: Villa Cornaro. Today the villa is privately owned, but just from outside it gives you the beauty of its architecture.

Duration: 20 minutes

Stop At: Centro Storico di Castelfranco Veneto, Via Riccati 14, 31033, Castelfranco Veneto Italy

Your morning excursion will end in a castle village where you will have your lunch. Castelfranco Veneto welcomes you with its clock tower, and imposing entrance gate surrounded by crenelated walls that preserve the colors and fragrances of an ancient history. Castelfranco is the city of Giorgione, an extraordinary artist of the Veneto Renaissance times, famous for his canvases of unrivaled beauty, from his Altarpiece to the Tempest.

Duration: 1 hour 30 minutes

Stop At: Villa Emo, Via Stazione 5, 31050 Fanzolo Italy

In the afternoon, close to Castelfranco Veneto, you will visit the second Palladian building: Villa Emo. In this villa, the buildings which functioned for the management of the estate, casually arranged around the threshing-floor of the Quattrocento villa, achieved an unforeseen architectural synthesis which united in a linear continuity the manorial house, barchesse and dove-cotes. The Palladian villa as the product of a new typology — where the practical necessities of agricultural life were translated into unheralded forms and a new language inspired by ancient architecture — without doubt finds its most definitive incarnation in the Villa Emo. The XVIth century interior frescoes of Zelotti are well preserved and of an intense expression.

Duration: 1 hour

Stop At: Villa Barbaro, Via Barbaro, 1, 31010, Maser Italy

You will continue your journey to reach Villa Barbaro located at 15 minutes driving distance from Villa Emo. The building was commissioned by the Barbaro brothers: Daniele and Marcantonio. Also in this villa the manor house and the barchesse are in line to make a compact architecture unity. Probably this solution was applied for the location of the villa, on the slopes of a hill. This disposition gives a great view from the road below. Paolo Veronese has decorated the rooms with a splendid cycle of frescoes, known as the most extraordinary of the Venetian Cinquecento.

At the end, you will return back to Venice by the countryside roads. The ride will take about 1 hour and 30 minutes. At your discretion, you can have a short stop half way for a cup of tea or something else.

Duration: 1 hour