See a Domus Restauro Gold Medal greenhouse inside one of Vicenza’s historic parks

About

Parco Querini is one of the large green spaces within walking distance of central Vicenza, bordered by the Bacchiglione and Astichello waterways and a surviving stretch of the city’s Venetian walls. Its present form dates largely from the early nineteenth century, when Antonio Capra converted agricultural land belonging to his family into a private garden. By the 1820s, the long avenue, circular hill, pond and neoclassical temple had already given the park much of the outline it retains today. Eventi Vicenza

The park became municipal property in the late 1960s and opened to the public in 1971. Today it combines two very different periods of Vicenza landscape architecture: an early nineteenth-century garden and one of the city’s most recent architectural restoration projects.

See the restored greenhouses ↓

The Serre Cunico

Near the Viale Rodolfi entrance are the former Cunico Greenhouses, completed in 2025 after a long restoration by Vicenza based MAP Studio.

Rather than reconstructing the lost nineteenth-century greenhouse as a replica, the architects retained the surviving masonry and reinstated the original volumes with a new metal structure. The asymmetrical frame marks the outline of the former hot and cold greenhouses while keeping the historical fabric visible. The project also restored the turret, introduced an elevated path along the old wall and improved access through this part of the park. map studio

In March 2026, the project received a Gold Medal at the tenth International Domus Restoration and Preservation Award, organised by the University of Ferrara and Fassa Bortolo. The jury cited the relationship between the surviving historic structures and the contemporary intervention, and the way the project reintroduced the greenhouses into the surrounding landscape. premiorestauro.it

The restored complex now includes serreQuerini, a botanical café managed by social cooperative AgenDo, alongside spaces for cultural, artistic and community activities. It opened in March 2026.

Walk through the older park ↓

The 19th-century garden

The greenhouses are the newest reason to visit; the landscape around them is considerably older.

A long tree lined avenue crosses the park towards a pond surrounding a circular island and neoclassical temple. The avenue dates from the enlargement of the garden in 1803. Around 40 of its approximately 100 hornbeams still survive from the original nineteenth-century planting, according to the Comune di Vicenza. Città di Vicenza

The park also contains statues, wooded areas and open lawns. Its waterways and the surviving Venetian walls make the boundaries unusually legible for a city park: this was once agricultural land at the edge of a private estate rather than an ornamental square inserted into the urban fabric. Eventi Vicenza

Find the temple ↓

The island and temple

The most recognisable view in Parco Querini is the small neoclassical temple raised above a circular island and reflected in the surrounding pond. The hill and temple formed part of the early nineteenth-century redesign and were already present by the 1820s. Vicenzaè

Together with the avenue and the restored greenhouses, it makes the park particularly useful for reading two centuries of changing ideas about urban landscape in a relatively small area: private Romantic-era garden, twentieth-century public park and contemporary conservation project.