Sasso Mobile

The Ice House (also called “the pantry”) is located in Grimaldi Park, in the heart of Sasso Marconi. Documented on a map dating from 1697, flanked by a grocers and a butchers, its primary function was to preserve food: meat, sausage, cheese, butter and other dairy products, by keeping them cold. The structure of the ice house, which is accessed through a small door, is composed of a deep, reversed truncated cone-shaped hole dug into the earth, covered with a semi-spherical dome. The inside walls were tiled with very thick stones cemented together, which allowed the temperature to remain constant. The top part was covered with soil and thick vegetation, contributing to maintaining internal coolness. In the winter, the farmers would collect snow from the fields, transport it and dump it into the ice house. There it was pressed into compact blocks of ice, which kept the space cool throughout the year. As the ice melted, the water collected on the flat bottom of the structure and was filtered into the ground through a metal grate.