Villa Naselli Agliata

Villa Naselli Agliata stands in Palermo, between the Oreto River and Monte Orecchiuta. The villa occupies the ground of the former village of Villagrazia, once called Contrada Ambleri, and goes back several centuries. Its fame rests on the camera dello scirocco, an underground chamber that Gerardo Alliata built in 1552.

The scirocco room lies entirely below ground, a refuge from the intense summer heat of Sicily. A long gallery and a hall fill the space, and a channel of spring water crosses both. The gallery runs beneath the garden, and light wells open through its barrel vault to carry daylight down. At the centre sits a rotunda, and above it rises a tower with a truncated conical shape. Beyond the rotunda, water from the Ambleri spring surfaces in a further room. Scirocco rooms of this kind are artificial caves cut into the rock, and Palermo has several. This one stands out for its size, and for the way it turns water and light into part of the architecture.

The chronicles of Palermo record the room as a summer gathering place. Guests of the highest nobility would find the tunnels dressed in fine fabrics, with orange and myrtle branches scenting the cool air. The villa has also served over the years for cultural events and exhibitions. Its garden and the ground around it give a sense of rural Palermo, from before the city reached this far. Down in the gallery, water still runs through the channel and daylight still drops in from the light wells.