Piazzale Ostiense
1920/23 Marcello Piacentini (1881/1960)
He abandoned the secessionist influence of his previous works and he designed here a kind of rural architecture
“Piacentini was inspired by two main ideas: the sea and classical antiquity. Besides, at that time the area was still almost in the country: there were only some monuments such as the Pyramid and, beyond it, Aventine and Testaccio hills. From the outside the station looks like an archaic temple, with its four pillars to support the pediment. And then the false fragments of sarcophagi and bas-reliefs with heads of the Gorgons, embedded in the outer walls. But the new railway was leading to the sea and he had to quote, that starting from the palm trees, planted at the beginning of the tracks. And then the decorations: on the ceiling crabs and flowers with petals of shells. And at the entrance three panels as graffiti on lime imitate the ancient mosaics of Ostia and those of the Villa of Pliny in Castel Fusano and have as subject marine mythological scenes: in one of them, two men have just caught a mermaid weeping. And yet nymphs and seahorses, in addition to Neptune and Poseidon. A sister station in Ostia was destroyed by bombing of World War Two” (Esther Palma - Corriere della Sera of 25 October 2004)
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