Villa Argentina

Villa Argentina, Viareggio 17 jul '19

Today I got up early, which is quite rare for me, and I decided to go to Viareggio to find a spot to paint, and stumbled upon the Villa Argentina, of which I painted this balcony with a big bougainvillea growing near it. I've been to Viareggio before but didn't know about this house. It's a beautiful ~100-year-old mansion, decorated with a lot of painted ceramic tiles on the outside, and a small garden at the entrance with several mature coral trees. Inside there wasn't much to see unfortunately. These days the mansion is used for exhibitions and other events, but there wasn't anything going on at the moment so it was all rather empty, and the inside is not as decorated as the outside, with the exception of one room on the ground floor, which has a beautiful renaissance-style gilded relief covering the walls and ceiling.
I painted the balcony before going inside, because I arrived a little before opening time, and decided to take a look inside when I was done. I was a bit disappointed to see it so empty, but pleasantly surprised that I could freely walk around the whole place and managed to find the balcony I'd painted from outside and did a thumbnail sketch of the spot where I'd been standing.