Sasso Mobile

There isn't a great deal of information documenting the history of this villa. Most likely constructed in the 16th century, it was owned by the Banzi family, part of the Bolognese aristocracy. The exterior is particularly lovely, with a triple-arched portico which opens out onto the garden, giving the main prospective of the building a feeling of lightness and exalting the elegance of its lines. It has been traditionally supposed that the surprising stairway in the interior leading to the upstairs loggia was designed by a member of great family of Bolognese architects, the Bibienas, in the mid-1700s. In effect, this hypothesis is confirmed by the quality of the structure's design: even in the limited space of a rectangular room, far removed from the grandiose, Baroque stairways, the architect managed to create an extraordinarily monumental, dramatic effect, lightened by elegant festoons representing flowers and fruit and other floral motifs scattered here and there to underline the architectural moldings and frames around the archways, some blind, some open, interpersed between the false columns. The building is in the middle of beautiful park, where the service buildings and its rural location indicate the villa's agricultural role through the course of the centuries. The wine cellar has recently been restored, and turned into a restaurant and cultural center, featuring local wines.