Contacts: To visit the Buonconsiglio Castle, booking is compulsory online or by phoning +39 0461 492811, Monday to Friday during the hours 9.00 – 13.00 and 14.00 – 16.00.
Opening hours: every day, except non-holiday Mondays and 25 December. May to November: 10 a.m. – 6 p.m.
The gardens of Buonconsiglio Castle, the cafeteria and the Bottega Buonconsiglio bookshop are freely accessible.
A Castle-Region, residence of the Prince-Bishops of Trento, between mighty structures and high walls hides gardens of various origins and memories of our history.
Already at the end of the 14th century, with Bishop George of Liechtenstein, the 13th-century castle was endowed with a garden, the object of special attention in the second half of the 15th century by Prince-Bishop Giovanni Hinderbach. However, in the climate preluding the Council of Trent, it was Bishop Bernardo Cles, who commissioned the sumptuous wing known as the ‘Magno Palazzo’ between 1527 and 1536, who defined the gardens, in particular the ‘zardino de sotto’ and the small ‘zardino de sora’ (the old hanging garden, today’s Courtyard of the Lions). Their spatial extension has come down to us, apart from the modifications in the third quarter of the 18th century, the near destruction in the Habsburg period and the restoration carried out by Giuseppe Gerola (the first superintendent of Italian Trento) in the 1920s, at the same time as the restoration of the monumental complex and the setting up of the Museum.
At present, the garden below, with its clear geometric composition, is bordered by a columned pergola with ancient vine plants and recent roses and consists of two areas: one with a simple lawn with shaped hedges, the other, after the driveway to the Palazzo Magno, is organised in flowerbeds, with osmanthus plants in the centre and topiary yews in the corners, arranged around a circular space where the Neptune Fountain used to be. Beyond a high crenellated wall is the original pomarium, still planted with fruit trees.
FOR MORE INFORMATION: www.gardenrouteitalia.it/museo-castello-del-buonconsiglio or www.buonconsiglio.it/Castello-del-Buonconsiglio
