Royal Castle of Govone

The interiors of the Castle of Govone testify to its different phases of construction and occupation.

The ground floor, the first to be built at the behest of Antonio Maurizio Solaro, is in purely 18th-century taste. Stucco and extremely fine decorations in soft colors take center stage, and the cross of the Order of Malta above the doors recalls that the first to live there was the Grand Prior himself.

Ascending to the piano nobile, the impression is of having changed eras. And here, in fact, most of the decorations date back to Carlo Felice (1765-1831), including those of the unmissable Hall of Honor, frescoed between 1819 and 1821 by Luigi Vacca and Fabrizio Sevesi on commission from the sovereign.

Carlo Felice had personally chosen the tragic legend of Niobe, punished by the gods for her hubris and forced to witness the killing of her twelve children.

The Hall of Honor is designed to resemble a theatrical set, and is polychrome only in the central part of the vault. The other walls imitate marble to create a trompe-l’œil architectural effect.

Also on the piano nobile, you can visit the Chinese Rooms or Princesses’ Apartment. These three rooms are entirely decorated with precious wallpaper from China, depicting trades and floral and animal motifs.

On the piano nobile of the Castle of Govone are the so-called Chinese Rooms, a group of three rooms known for having hosted three royal princesses and consisting of an audience hall, bedroom, and cabinet (boudoir).

These rooms are entirely decorated with wallpaper made of plant fibers of Chinese manufacture, purchased by the Solaro counts in the first half of the 18th century in Vienna, but probably originating from London, the main port and market for goods arriving from China. The 18th century saw tremendous interest on the part of noble elites in the Far East, with widespread circulation of imported goods in European residences. The Solaro choice is therefore not surprising.

What makes the wallpapers of Govone unique is not their origin, but what they represent.

While it was not at all rare to find rooms decorated in oriental style, they were united by the presence of floral and animal motifs, such as those visible in the castle’s boudoir.

Much more unusual, almost unique, was the depiction of trades and production present in the other two rooms: tea production and silk for the audience hall, and rice and porcelain for the bedroom. Small scenes of daily life, populated by dozens of miniature figures, inhabit the castle spaces, offering visitors a vision unique in Piedmont and extremely rare in Europe (fewer than a dozen similar representations are found today across the entire continent).

The reason for this choice by the Solaro family remains partly a mystery, but can perhaps be explained by the commercial interests of the territory: silk, rice, and to a lesser extent porcelain were (and still are) among the best-known products of Piedmont, and therefore their presence on Chinese wallpaper may have attracted the Solaro family’s attention at the time of purchase.