Villa Paganini is a small historic park on Via Nomentana, directly opposite the much larger Villa Torlonia. It is easy to overlook, which is part of its charm. The garden offers winding paths, mature trees, a small rustic lake, fountains and traces of the romantic landscape style that shaped the property in the 19th century….
Villa Glori is a wooded hill between Flaminio and Parioli, just behind the Auditorium Parco della Musica. Unlike Rome’s aristocratic villas, it developed less as a formal suburban residence and more as open land used for vineyards and hunting. Today it is a public park of pines, cypresses, oaks, olive trees and sloping paths, with…
Monte Ciocci is one of the best places in Rome for a broad, open view toward St Peter’s dome without paying for a rooftop or joining a crowd at a famous terrace. The park rises between the Vatican area and Monte Mario and combines grass, eucalyptus, local walking paths and a panoramic edge from which…
The Museo Laboratorio della Mente is one of Rome’s most unusual museums because it deals with the history of mental health care through people, institutions, memory and social change rather than through a conventional collection of masterpieces. It occupies part of the former Santa Maria della Pietà psychiatric hospital complex in north-west Rome and uses…
Porta Pia is a place where architecture, military history and the story of modern Italy overlap. The gate was designed for Pope Pius IV in the 16th century with the involvement of Michelangelo, while the surrounding area became famous for the Breach of Porta Pia on 20 September 1870. Inside the complex, the Museo Storico…
Villa Gordiani is one of Rome’s most rewarding combinations of archaeology and everyday neighborhood life. Along Via Prenestina, a public park spreads across both sides of the road around the remains of a large Roman estate traditionally associated with the Gordian imperial family. It does not have the monumental staging of the Forum or the…
Piazza Mattei is a small square in Rome’s historic Jewish Ghetto area, but it contains one of the city’s most charming Renaissance fountains. The Fontana delle Tartarughe, or Turtle Fountain, combines bronze youths, dolphins, marble basins and the famous turtles that give the monument its popular name. Because the square is compact and free to…
A few minutes from the Trevi Fountain, Galleria Sciarra is one of those Roman spaces that feels hidden even though it sits in the middle of the historic center. The covered courtyard was created during the transformation of Rome after it became the capital of Italy, and its richly painted walls make it one of…
Hidden beneath the busy rail approaches near Porta Maggiore is one of Rome’s strangest ancient interiors. The Basilica Sotterranea di Porta Maggiore is not a Christian basilica in the ordinary sense, but a first-century underground hall whose white stucco decoration is filled with mythological, ritual and symbolic scenes. Its purpose is still debated, which is…
The Basilica of Santi Bonifacio e Alessio is one of the Aventine’s most rewarding quiet churches. Its medieval courtyard, Romanesque bell tower, crypt and unusual devotional objects provide a strong contrast with the nearby panoramic gardens and the better-known Santa Sabina. The church is especially memorable because of the legend of Saint Alexius. A preserved…