The Villa Comunale is in Piazza Marconi, a lush historic garden that surprises visitors for the variety and beauty of its flowers The Villa can be considered the town’s first touristic infrastructure. In the summertime it is a green oasis where the townspeople, under the shade of the centuries-old trees, can find quiet and reprieve from the hot temperature.
It can also be considered a botanical garden for the great variety and rarity of trees, plants and shrubs.
The local administration began the construction works in 1880. Honorary director was the Baron Vincenzo Messina di Bibbia, who was a scholar, a poet and the mayor of the town. Unfortunately, he died tragically during the works, in June 1881. In his remembrance, in 1894 a marble bust was placed in the Villa. Initially, the Villa stretched out along three avenues: a wide central one, and two narrower lateral ones. In 1881, an orna-
mental stone sculpture carved by Giuseppe Giuliano, the “Flora” was placed at the end of the central avenue.
At the centre of an elegant design of flowerbeds, lies a pond with water lilies and coloured fish. In the following years, the paths going from the entrance towards the thicket were set out. In the postwar period the path that flanks Via Purbella was embelli-
shed with holm oaks dedicated to the fallen war veterans; the walkway is in fact called “Rimembranze”, memories.
Between the 1950s and 1960s the kiosk (a small refreshment area) and the “Rotonda”, a dancing floor, were built. In the1970s, the Villa was further enlarged.
