Villa delle Peschiere, Renaissance villa in Castelletto district, Genoa, Italy

Villa delle Peschiere is a 16th-century villa in Castelletto, Genoa, built around 1560 for the nobleman Tobia Pallavicino. Its design is attributed to Galeazzo Alessi, with two main entrances, one on each side, linking the garden, central rooms and staircase. The south facade carries Ionic and Corinthian pilasters, a cornice and a balustrade.

Tobia Pallavicino, a wealthy alum merchant, built the villa around 1560 as a suburban retreat outside Genoa's walls. Raffaele Soprani attributed the design to Galeazzo Alessi in 1674, though he suspected Giovanni Battista Castello il Bergamasco had a hand in some reforms and additions. The villa was altered and restored before 1846, and in the second half of the 19th century its park was cut by the opening of via Peschiera.

The villa's name refers to the fish ponds (peschiere) that supplied the household, and the garden was laid out with scenographic terraces, a serliana facade and an artificial grotto decorated with polychrome mosaics and caryatids on the jambs. Charles Dickens stayed here and described the view over Genoa and the Acquasola gardens from the park in Pictures from Italy.

The villa stands at via San Bartolomeo degli Armeni, in the Castelletto quarter, on rising ground above the city centre; the address is reached on foot from the Manin area. Via Peschiera, opened in the second half of the 19th century, cut through the former park, so the surviving garden lies close around the building. The villa still belongs to the Pallavicino family, so the grounds are not a public site and access depends on the owners.

The hexagonal bathroom, a fashion of the period documented in several Genoese villas, survives only here; its stuccoes were made by Marcello Sparzo, a pupil of Giovanni Battista Castello. The Savoys hid the Shroud of Turin in the villa when the French threatened Turin.