palazzo, privato, Palazzo Ottolini

This is a Renaissance palazzo, but it does not stand alone. In fact, it is so tightly woven into the urban fabric that its south-east facade is physically locked to the neighbouring building, “Il Castello”, by a high-level vaulted passage. This stone cross-vault, resting on half-pilasters, bridges what was once a narrow alley, turning it into a covered walkway. Beneath this passage, the main entrance, a round-arched stone portal with a shaped keystone, still holds its ground, though its decoration is now too worn to read.

The palazzo rises on a regular plan over two floors and a semi-basement. On the better-preserved north-east side, four rectangular stone-framed windows are arranged in two tiers; the upper ones sit on projecting corbels and have transom lights above. The south-west elevation is harder to read, scarred by a collapse and rebuilt with iron tie-rods. The roof is a simple pavilion, its eaves supported by moulded corbels. A private townhouse, then, but one that was clearly built to be part of a larger conversation, with its neighbours, with the street, and with the awkward geometry of an Italian hill-town.

Description via source. Coordinates and heritage data from the Atika atlas.