Palacento 1913-2013

Palacento celebrates 100 years of history, culture, hospitality and tourism during which Palace Grand Hotel has maintained its original activity. Even a hundred years later it has the energy to be mentioned among the most famous historical hotels at an international level. Giuseppe Sommaruga, the designer of the architectural complex of Campigli Hill, is one of Liberty leading figures. Recognized by his contemporaries as the most prestigious Italian architect, his reputation among scholars and critics was obscured over time, in conjunction with the progressive Liberty decline and rejection. A revival of interest in Liberty, brought about by a critical review which took place in the sixties, promoted a more careful consideration of one phase of Italian artistic culture, precisely spanning between 1890 and 1915, that has been only marginally investigated by artistic historiography, and asserts its peculiarities and connotations. In this monography, reality and fantasy are intertwined, to tell the Hotel’s artistic and architectural value and to merge it with the perceived imagination; therefore the winner short stories of a centennial fiction award are also published.