62 



GARDEN CRAFT IN EUROPE 



example of the way in which the Italian villa has been so often spoiled, 

 and we would fain see the beautiful terraces and pavilions that Dal Re 

 engraves instead of the present meaningless plan. The water approach 

 alone remains of all the former beauties of this garden. 



All along the Italian Riviera were beautiful villas ; their situations, with 

 the mountain scenery behind and the blue Mediterranean in front, could 

 hardly fail to inspire a garden designer. In the environs of Genoa, and 

 especially at the fashionable suburb of Sampierdarena, were many fine villas 

 with stately gardens, pleasure houses of the merchant princes of Genoa, 

 who in the sixteenth century commissioned such artists as Galeazzo Alessi, 

 Giacoma della Porta, Pirro Ligorio, and Annibale Lippi to build their 

 sumptuous palaces. With very few exceptions these have long since dis- 

 appeared, but fortunately an excellent series of records of the finest villas 

 was made in 1832 by M. Gauthier.i The situations were in some respects 

 unsuited to gardens, the soil being barren and rocky, and the designers 

 resorted more especially to architecture in order to obtain their effects, and 

 instead of hoschi which are so general in Italy, we find an extensive use of 

 pergolas, in order that all parts of the garden might be reached in shade. 



1 See Les -plus beaux Edifices de la Ville de Genes et de ses Environs, par M. P. Gauthier. Paris. 

 1832. 



SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY 

 TERRA-COTTA VASE AND STAND. 



