Palazzo del Giardino

The main Ducal Palace in Parma, the Palazzo della Pilotta and the Reinach Theater were all destroyed in an early morning air raid on 13 May 1944, carried out by the 465th Heavy Bombardment Group of the US Airforce, 781st Squadron, which dropped 9 GP bombs on the city centre.

Construction of a palace at the site was commissioned in 1561 by Duke Ottavio Farnese, who needed to establish a fixed base for the court of his Duchy of Parma and Piacenza.

Giovanni Boscoli designed a large fountain in front of the new palace, with several statues and water features - Vitellozzo Vitelli argued in a letter to Pico della Mirandola that it was superior to that at the Palazzo Farnese in Caprarola.

Post-war rebuilding became entangled in bureaucracy even after the Palazzo became a base for the Comando della Legione of the Carabinieri - reconstruction work on the completely-destroyed south-west wing only began in 1959 and was completed in 1968.

A monumental 17th-century staircase leads to a large salone on the first floor, named the Sala degli Uccelli after its stucco and fresco decoration of 224 species of birds by Benigno Bossi.