OLYMPIC STADIUM

STADIO OLIMPICO
Via dello Stadio Olimpico

In the years 1928/32 Enrico Del Debbio (1891/1973) prepared the project with the name of Stadio dei Cipressi (Stadium of the Cypresses) for mass demonstrations

In 1937 Angelo Frisa and Achille Pintonello (1902/?) took up the design but the stadium was never finished

In 1952 Annibale Vitellozzi (1902/90), Carlo Roccatelli and Cesare Valle (1902/2000) designed it again on the basis of the Stadium of the Cypresses and finally built it

It is used for athletics and football
Currently the capacity is 72,698 seats
It was restructured in 1990 with the addition of the roof

PALACE OF THE MINISTRY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS

PALAZZO DEL MINISTERO DEGLI ESTERI

Piazzale della Farnesina 1

Also known as La Farnesina from the name of the area that was property of the Farnese family

Begun in 1938 as Palazzo del Littorio (Palace of the Lictor, the officer bearing the fasces in ancient Rome) by Enrico Del Debbio (1891/1973), Arnaldo Foschini (1884/1968) and Vittorio Ballio Morpurgo (1890/1966)

Discontinued in 1943 due to the war and completed in 1956

“In a sense, it resumed the self-contradictions of Italian architecture towards the end of the thirties, when the stimuli and the openings to a renewal that had seemed possible in some cases, were in fact undermined and resized by the monumental involution of rhetorical and representative architecture desired by the fascist regime” (Enrico Valeriani - Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani Treccani)

In front of the palace FOUNTAIN by Enrico Del Debbio with “Big Sphere” 1968 by Arnaldo Pomodoro (1926)

PIAZZA DELLA FARNESINA (Farnesina Square) driveway opened in the years 1998/2002 by Umberto Riva (1928)

It is the largest palace in Rome with about 1,200 rooms on 120,000 square meters (29.6 acres) and 720,000 cubic meters (25.4 million cubic feet)

The cubic square footage is similar to that of the Royal Palace of Caserta and they share tied the record for the largest palace of Italy

Ceilings of the main rooms decorated with gilded stucco by the Hungarian Amerigo Tot (1909/84) and by Alberto Bevilacqua and with wood by Giorgio Quaroni (1907/60)

Since 2000, it houses a collection of Italian contemporary art with over 200 works including paintings, sculptures, mosaics and installations

ITALIAN FORUM

FORO ITALICO

Piazzale del Foro Italico

Begun in the years 1928/32 by Enrico Del Debbio (1891/1973)

Continued in the years 1936/41 by Luigi Moretti (1907/73) who later was the architect of the Watergate complex in Washington DC and of the Stock Exchange Tower in Montreal

"In Del Debbio's project is still clear the intention to create a landscape in which architectural and natural elements are brought into harmony, with a reference to models that can be derived from the Greek architecture or from the large late Roman villas (...). Starting in 1933, Del Debbio's original scheme would be slowly modified by the insertion of a series of buildings and monumental works designed by different architects, that without being able to modify significantly the plan, would however distort the guidelines in a monumental sense" (Enrico Valeriani - Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani Treccani)

"Despite its construction lasted for almost thirty years through a series of successive amendments, the Foro Italico is still, within the city of Rome, an urban intervention of considerable interest for its overall structure, for the extension and combination of the areas designated for buildings and public parks, and for the quality of some of the buildings and their location in the landscape" (Piero Ostilio Rossi)

ACCADEMIA DI EDUCAZIONE FISICA
(Academy of Physical Education)

1926/32 Enrico Del Debbio with Paolini, Delfinà and Giannelli

Now Palazzo del CONI (Palace of CONI, the Italian National Olympic Commitee) with mosaics by Angelo Canevari (1901/55) and works by Emilio Greco (1913/95), Romano Dazzi and Giuseppe Ciotti (1898/1991) from the Friuli region

"The outer surfaces, characterized by the contrast of the Pompeian red - reminiscent, however, of the red sand used on athletic tracks - with inserts of travertine, show the deliberate quoting of classical architecture, filtered through the modern language" (Giorgio Muratore)

PALAZZO DELL'ISTITUTO UNIVERSITARIO DI SCIENZE MOTORIE

(Palace of the University Faculty for Physical Education)

1937 Costantino Costantini (1904/82). Similar to Palace of CONI

On the ground floor indoor pool with mosaics by Giulio Rosso (1897/1976) and frescoes "Athletes and divers" by Angelo Canevari (1901/55)

On the first floor gym built for Mussolini 1936 by Luigi Moretti, with mosaics by Gino Severini (1883/1966) and two statues by Silvio Canevari

PIAZZALE DEL MONOLITE (Square of the Monolith)

1937 Luigi Moretti

"Monolith" 1928/32 Costantino Costantini, 36.59 m (120 feet) high including the base and the golden spire. It was believed that the spire was of pure gold and on 25 July 1943 with the fall of the fascist regime, some people ran up with ladders and tools to get the gold, only to find out that it was just golden paint

"Fountain of the Sphere" 1933 Mario Paniconi, Giulio Pediconi and Antonello Frisa. Mosaics by Giulio Rosso (1897/1976)

It is a traditional meeting place for football fans attending matches at the nearby Stadio Olimpico

STADIO DEI MARMI (Stadium of the Marbles)

1928/32 Enrico Del Debbio with Paolini, Delfinà and Giannelli. The mosaics are by Angelo Canevari (1901/55)

The capacity is about 5,300 seats

"60 statues of athletes" gift of many Italian cities sculpted in the years 1932/33 by 24 different artists including:

Attilio Selva (1888/1970) from Trieste who made four

Silvio Canevari also sculptor of four statues

Carlo De Veroli sculptor of no less than ten statues

Also Libero Andreotti, Eugenio Baroni, Nicola D'Antino (1880/1966), Tommaso Bertolino (1866/1978), Francesco Messina (1900/95), Publio Morbiducci (1889/1963) and Ercole Drei (1886/1973)

In the grandstand "Two bronze groups of fighters" and at the entrance of the track other "Two bronze groups of fighters" by Aroldo Bellini (1902/84) who made a total of 17 statues for the stadium, including four made out of bronze

TENNIS COURTS (formerly Real Tennis Stadium)

1933/34 Costantino Costantini. Statues by Eugenio Baroni

OLYMPIC SWIMMING STADIUM

1958/60 Enrico Del Debbio and Annibale Vitellozzi (1902/90)

FORESTERIA SUD (South guest quarters)

1932/36 Enrico Del Debbio. Since 1967 it became a youth hostel

CASA INTERNAZIONALE DELLO STUDENTE

(International Student House)

1960 Enrico Del Debbio and Piero Maria Lugli

FORESTERIA NORD (North Guest Quarters)

1935/36 Costantino Costantini. Formerly the seat of the Italian Littorio Youth

ACCADEMIA DI SCHERMA (Academy of Fencing)

1932/36 Luigi Moretti. Also known as Casa delle Armi, House of Weapons

L shaped plan for three halls: the library, the reception room and the gym

In the library mosaic by Angelo Canevari (1901/55) and fresco by Achille Capizzano

Fully lined with Carrara marble, is a classic example of Roman architecture between the wars

The gym allowed the simultaneous presence of 160 fencers 

"The personal research of Moretti takes a precise physiognomy in which the rationalist starting point is tamed with a method of formal control of classical derivation and particular attention to the bright and rarefied spacial solutions" (Piero Ostilio Rossi) 

In 1981 it was adapted awkwardly to courtroom and it was known as the bunker courtroom. It was the seat of many important trials of the Court of Rome including one for the kidnapping and killing of the former Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro

FACULTY OF ARCHITECTURE IN VALLE GIULIA

FACOLTÀ DI ARCHITETTURA DI VALLE GIULIA

Via Gramsci 53

1926 designed by Enrico Del Debbio (1891/1973) and completed only in 1932

"What is most surprising is the ease with which Del Debbio passes from one style to another: from Baroque to the almost Liberty style, from Rationalism tinged with the colors of Futurism to the Neo-Academical, from Neo-Realism to Classicism up to a sweetened "Brutalism" that, at times, slightly recalls the poetic material of Mario Ridolfi" (Luigi Prestinenza Puglisi)

DON ORIONE INSTITUTE

CENTRO DON ORIONE

Via della Camilluccia 112/120

Religious institute with an orphanage, a center for rehabilitation and a vocational training center

It incorporated, distorting the original relationship with the environment of the summit of Monte Mario, the COLONIA ELIOTERAPICA (heliotherapy camp) designed by Enrico Del Debbio (1891/1973) in 1934 and built the following year, in just 75 days

A single floor about 400 m long (1,300 feet) for dormitories with room for up to 800 boys and girls

"The building features a floor plan that fits discreetly into the natural environment, reflecting the interest shown by Del Debbio for the architecture of northern Europe. These Baltic suggestions are also attested by the extreme simplification of the language, which is reduced to a minimum, far from any pomposity" (Giorgio Muratore)

"In this episode of 'minor' architecture, less influenced by celebratory needs, Del Debbio moves on a different line from that of the Foro Italico. He used, certainly with interesting results, a very concise formal system together with a simplified architectural language, almost 'minimal'" (Piero Ostilio Rossi)

"Statue of the Madonna Salus Populi Romani" by Arrigo Minerbi (1881/1960) inaugurated April 5, 1953 in gilded copper, 11 m (36 feet) high. It is visible from the Olympic Stadium. It was built as a thanksgiving to Our Lady for the end of World War II

Arrigo Minerbi was Jewish and he had taken refuge in the Opera Don Orione Home in Rome to escape racial persecution. He had carved the relief of the left door of the Cathedral of Milan

The material for the statue came from the copper pots all collected by orphaned and maimed children of Don Orione or offered by the faithful

It was demolished by a tornado in October 2009 and restored in 2010