Villa Padovani (villapadovani.it) is a 17th-century Venetian villa on the morainic hills of Verona, at the gateway to Valpolicella and close to Lake Garda: Lazise is 7 km away, Verona 18 km. Listed by the Italian Fine Arts authority, it is classified "5 Leoni" by the Istituto Regionale per le Ville Venete, received the Premio Villa Veneta 2018 for its restoration, and is a member of the Associazione Dimore Storiche Italiane (ADSI).
The courtyard appears in the records from 1652, when the Orci family lived here; on 26 April 1672 it passed to Giuseppe Carminati, a cheese merchant from Bergamo, whose coat of arms — a crowned eagle on a farm cart, a heraldic unicum — has adorned the keystone of the gateway since 1692. Under the Marinelli family it lived its golden age; in 1796 General Masséna set up his headquarters here, and memory has it that Napoleon, Masséna and Moreau tethered their horses to the courtyard vine on their return from Rivoli.
Ten suites for adults only, never more than twenty guests: understated elegance, silence, authenticity. In the old cellar lies the Caneva: an indoor pool at 33 °C, a whirlpool at 37 °C, sauna and steam bath. Outdoors, the outdoor pool at 31 °C. The brolo, a walled orchard mentioned in the records since 1672, is the villa's secret garden; the Oratory of the
Assumption, built by the Marinelli family in the late 18th century to a design by Adriano Cristofoli, houses the altarpiece of Our Lady of La Salette.
Beneath the brolo rises a hyperthermal spring at 52.9 °C, the hottest ever found in the province of Verona. Its water fills the outdoor bath of Le Terme di Remo, the house's private thermal establishment (35–37 °C); its warmth, through heat exchangers and with no combustion at all, heats the pools, the whirlpool and the domestic hot water. Open from mid-March to the end of October.
Cin: IT023057B43QJVI7T7
