Villas in Florence: Villa Favard in Rovezzano
Villa Favard, which in the past was also called "Palagio dei pini" (Palace of the pines), belonged to the Cerchi and then to the Bartolini families. At the beginning of the 16th century, Zanobi Bartolini commissioned the architect Baccio d`Agnolo to design the garden.
Prince Stanislao Poniatowsky, who had bought the villa in 1823, sold it to baroness Favard in 1855. The new owner transformed the villa in a sort of meeting centre for the most important men of letters and art of the time.
This was the period in which architect Giuseppe Poggi, who worked a lot in Florence, renovated the villa and its garden.
Poggi realized a new approach to the villa, the stables and a chapel, which was then decorated with frescoes by Dupré and Gatti. The park was transformed into an English garden, where exotic plants were bedded.
Baroness Favard died in 1889 and the villa experienced a long period of decadence. During World War II the German troops occupied the building; then, at the end of the war, in 1949, the villa was given to the "Opera Madonnina del Grappa", a Florentine charitable institution.
Due to the urbanistic changes that have concerned this part of Florence and to the opening of a new road, the villa has been separated from the chapel and the park, which now belongs to the Municipality of Florence.
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