LECCO: PALAZZO DELLE PAURE, Lecco : Palazzo Delle Paure
Language: English / USA
Hi, I am Marcy, your personal guide, and together with MyWoWo I’d like to welcome you to one of the wonders of the world: Palazzo delle Paure.
The Palazzo delle Paure, despite its eerie name – Paure means fears – there is nothing scary about the building or the events surrounding its history.
In fact, it has always been a public office building and its name is linked to a nickname given to it by the people of Lecco because taxes were paid here until 1964.
The current building is the result of a magnificent restoration carried out around 2008 and concluded in 2012 with the opening of the exhibition rooms to the public.
The palace was originally built in 1905, then demolished in 1916 and rebuilt in its current style, which can be described as medieval eclectic. The eclectic style is a mix of different styles, some dating back to different eras, and this can be seen in the gray ashlar band that characterizes the ground floor, which contrasts with the smooth walls of the upper floors. Particularly noteworthy are the tower, only built in 1926 and adorned with a shield of the historic Visconti family, salvaged from another palace, and the decorations reminiscent of medieval battlements.
Inside are temporary and permanent exhibitions and a real treasure for mountain lovers: the mountaineering observatory, the Osservatorio Alpinistico Lecchese, which recounts the history of mountaineering and climbers in the area through historical exhibits, films, interactive screens and even a climbing wall.
Among the works in the permanent exhibition by important local and Italian artists, I would like to point out a sculpture by Giorgio Pomodoro, one of the most internationally renowned abstract sculptors of the 20th century. This is the “Model for Dioscuri”, made between 1975 and 1999 in black Belgian marble, inspired by the myth of the brothers Castor and Pollux, sons of Zeus, known as the Dioscuri.
I bid you farewell with an interesting fact: Do you know who the Ragni di Lecco are? Ragni means spiders in Italian but they are not cute arachnids: they are members of Lecco's most important mountaineering club, who distinguish themselves by wearing red sweaters with a spider symbol. They include one of the greatest climbers ever, Riccardo Cassin, who climbed some of the world's highest peaks. You can discover his history and much more in the museum dedicated to mountaineering on the top floor of the Palazzo delle Paure.
