Villa Venier, Eighteenth-century Venetian villa in Sommacampagna, Italy.
Villa Venier is an 18th-century patrician villa near Verona, owned by the municipality of Sommacampagna. The main building has three floors plus a basement, an L-shaped plan and a symmetrical neoclassical façade with smooth ashlar on the ground floor. A large central hall links the park to the rear courtyard, and an octagonal chapel dedicated to the Holy Family, built in 1838 by Francesco Ronzani, adjoins the ground floor.
The Venetian Venier family held land at Sommacampagna from 1589 and lived in the villa until 1860. The building, probably erected over an earlier farmhouse, was designed in 1784, possibly by Adriano Cristofali or his pupil Luigi Trezza. After several changes of ownership, the Comune di Sommacampagna bought and restored the complex in 1997.
The octagonal chapel of the Sacra Famiglia, added in 1838 by architect Francesco Ronzani for Giuseppe Venier, keeps a white marble altar; the rest of its furnishings are gone. Ground-floor rooms are frescoed with vine branches, grape clusters and flowers, while the first-floor hall has painted coffered ceilings and neoclassical columns.
The complex is owned and managed by the Comune of Sommacampagna, which bought and restored it in 1997. The Italian-style park, with its avenue, staircase and fountain, hosts theatre and music performances in summer and other events through the year; the interior rooms are used for temporary exhibitions and conferences, and also house the Archivio Storico Comunale and private firms.
The octagonal chapel of the Holy Family was added in 1838 by architect Francesco Ronzani at the wish of Giuseppe Venier; only its white marble altar survives, next to a small sacristy.
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