Villa Gernetto, Lesmo, Neoclassical villa in Lesmo, Italy.

Villa Gernetto is a late-neoclassical complex in Gerno, a hamlet of Lesmo, with several wings forming large courtyards. A pale yellow building with a long brown roof and evenly spaced rectangular windows stands above a curved stone terrace with a balustrade over a dark pool. A tall white belvedere tower with an open railed deck and slender spire rises beside it.

A fortress with a tower stood on the Gernetto hill in the 5th–6th centuries, sheltering people fleeing Milan. In the early 17th century the Marchesi Molinari turned this fortified core into a holiday house. Simone Cantoni erected the villa in the second half of the 18th century; Gian Luca della Somaglia added the courtyard, the chapel of San Carlo and the park bridge in 1815.

The villa's name shifts with its owners: Molinari, Mellerio and Somaglia all left their mark on it. In 1816 Count Giacomo Mellerio, vice-president of the Lombardo-Veneto government, held lavish receptions here. The private chapel of San Carlo once held two funeral reliefs carved by Canova, alongside sculptures by Fabris.

The complex stands on the Gernetto hill above the Lambro valley, reached from Gerno, a hamlet of Lesmo. Since 1975 it has been a corporate training centre, first for Credito Italiano and later Pirelli & C. Real Estate, and since 2007 it belongs to Fininvest Sviluppi Immobiliari. It is private property, so visits are not open to the public and access depends on the owner's arrangements.

In 1818, workers uncovered a collection of ancient Roman gold coins from the late imperial period while working on the grounds. The discovery revealed that the area had been inhabited and used for a very long time before the mansion was built.