The chinoiserie rooms
Eighteenth-century oriental lacquer panels.
Eccekevin — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Public domain · Zairon — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Zairon — CC BY-SA 4.0
A royal villa with a vineyard inside the city: Villa della Regina stands on the hill of the Po's eastern bank, built in the seventeenth century for a Savoy prince and later the residence of widowed queens — from which its name comes. It is one of the UNESCO-listed Residences of the Royal House of Savoy. The building is Italianate with terraced gardens climbing behind it, with fountains, stairs and artificial grottoes, while its interiors are decorated in the chinoiserie the eighteenth century loved: panels in oriental lacquer and imagined eastern scenes — among the finest surviving examples in Italy. Its strangest feature is that it still makes wine: a historic vineyard on its slope has been revived, the only vineyard within the boundaries of a major Italian city. It stood abandoned and damaged by the bombing of 1943 until restoration opened it in 2006. The view from its garden over Turin with the Alps behind is among the city's finest.
Eighteenth-century oriental lacquer panels.
Fountains, stairs and grottoes up the hill.
Strada Comunale Santa Margherita 79, Turin
Monte dei CappucciniOn the Capuchin knoll above the Po's right bank stands a small church with a kin10 minutes walk4.6
National Mountain Museum (Duca degli Abruzzi)In August 1874 the city of Turin, at the proposal of the Italian Alpine Club's T11 minutes walk4.3
Piazza Vittorio VenetoA large square east of central Turin ending at the river Po, among the largest a15 minutes walk4.6
Accorsi-Ometto Museum of Decorative ArtsIn the room that carries his name stands a bureau made by Pietro Piffetti in 17319 minutes walk4.6
Mole AntonellianaThe Mole is Turin as the Eiffel Tower is Paris: a 167-metre needle that at compl21 minutes walk4.5Twelve palaces and villas around Turin built by the ruling house between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries (among them the Royal Palace, Venaria and Stupinigi), all UNESCO-listed together in 1997.