Palazzo della Civiltà Italiana and EUR

Landmark · EUR (Municipio IX)Rome,Italy

A white marble cube of 216 identical arches, emblem of a Rome quarter built for a world's fair that never opened.

The Palazzo della Civiltà Italiana is a white marble cube cut through by rows of identical arches on all four sides: nine across and six down on each face, 216 in all. An inscription runs round the top calling the Italians a people of poets, artists, heroes, saints, thinkers, scientists, navigators and travellers, and twenty-eight statues stand in the arches of the ground floor. A popular claim ties the arch numbers to the letter counts of Benito and Mussolini; no document supports it. It is the emblem of EUR, a quarter designed as a world's fair for 1942 that never opened. The plan was a permanent district of wide boulevards, marble, colonnades and a lake, laid out south of the city to show what the Fascist government thought a modern Roman city should look like. The war stopped the work, and in the 1950s the quarter was completed and filled with ministries and offices. It is the most complete Fascist city plan still standing anywhere. The palace itself sat empty for decades and now houses a fashion company's head office.

Worth knowing

Good to know

Shoot from the corner, not the front — from straight ahead the arches look like a flat grid, while from the corner you see two sides at once and the arcade gains depth.
Late afternoon or early morning — the white marble goes flat and glaring in midday sun, and low light brings out the arches and the statues at the base.
The building is closed to visitors — it holds private offices, and only the ground-floor hall opens, free of charge, and only when an exhibition is running.

Things to do

1
Walk the arcade at the base of the palace
Go up one of the four staircases and into the ground-floor arcade. As you walk, each arch frames a different section of the quarter outside, and the twenty-eight statues stand between the arches right beside you. Going all the way round takes a few minutes, and every side of the building looks exactly the same.
2
Follow the boulevard down to the lake
From the palace, take the main avenue south past the domed congress hall and the government ministries. The ground then opens onto an artificial lake with a bridge across it. This is the district's plan doing exactly what it was designed to do: long straight streets, marble fronts, and water at the far end. It is also where local families spend Sunday.
3
Read the inscription round the top
Stand back far enough on any side to take in the upper cornice, then read the line of capital letters running round the whole building. It takes a full circuit to reach the end of the sentence. Read it as what it is: a statement carved by a government about the people it governed.