A great number of named villas were built in Naples from the 1500s through the early 1900s. They were purposely built outside the crowded urban nucleus of the city and usually named after a single head of family, often a nobleman. These exclusive villas have almost all been encroached upon by urbanization and subdivision. Some of the villas have simply been demolished, but quite a few still exist; they are, however, “lost” in the sense that they are now surrounded by the “background noise” of overurbanization.

One such building is the Villa Belvedere, located on what was once the bucolic southern slope of the Vomero hill, overlooking the sea. You can find it if you know where to look; some hint comes from the name “Belvedere.” There is a via Belvedere in the Vomero section of Naples; branching off from the road, there is smaller viale Belvedere, which, lo and behold, terminates at the villa Belvedere.

The villa was built in the late 1600s by a Flemish merchant, cited in sources as “Ferdinando Vandeyeden” (also cited as Vandeneynden). The architect was a monk from Bologne, Brother Bonaventura Presti—architect, carpenter, engineer and all- round Baroque factotum in Naples in the service of archbishop, Ascanio Filomarino. Presti also helped design the main port facilities in Naples and contributed to the Spanish remake of the San Martino monastery. The villa Belvedere was built in the years 1671-1673.

The original owner’s daughter married into the Carafa family and the property thus took the name “Villa Carafa di Belvedere.” (Although “Belvedere” generically means “panorama” or “scenic outlook” and is so used quite often in Italian, in this case the word is actually part of the family name and defines the particular branch of the family. The Carafas were one of the oldest noble families in Naples with hundreds of feudal properties throughout southern Italy in the middle ages. The name is attached to other sites in the city, as well, including the Palazzo Carafa di Belvedere on the Riviera di Chiaia.)

The villa itself was expanded greatly in the 1700s. Those changes still define the villa; it was truly a residence of royal proportions, a sumptuous vacation spot for the likes of Queen Caroline, consort of King Ferdinand. Entry was from the north along the tree-lined viale Belvedere, then through a rear gate into the courtyard of the villa, itself; you can still pass through an arch in the main building to the terrace and garden in front, a large rectangular embankment still resting on the series of high, arched loges dug into the tufa hillside when the structure was expanded in the 1700s. The loges formed essentially a basement to the villa and served for storage. Today, the southern and western panoramic parts of the building sit directly on a road built in the 1920s, via Aniello Falcone, a major thoroughfare, one of the main roads up to the Vomero section of town. As well, the villa is flanked by modern buildings and is, itself, subdivided into various “apartments”. (The premises also house a nursery school.) Yet, even today, the villa is set high enough to overlook most of the encroachments from the 1900s. As strange as it seems, it is still a little bit of the mid-1700s lost in the big city.