Scenarios and ferment of Bologna

30-10-2017 | Style & Culture

Written by: Giancarlo Roversi

Scenarios, ferment and climate of Bologna in the early years of the «Baglioni»

When Guido Baglioni moved to the Umbilicum Urbis, Bologna experienced a period of great fervor and stood out as one of Italy's most dynamic centers, both economically and culturally, thanks to brilliant entrepreneurs, astute public administrators, and an authoritative array of intellectuals and admired university professors. Bologna, with a population of 172,000, is increasingly becoming a hub for the country's road and rail communications. So much so that, as some advertisements of the time reveal, many of the city's artisan tailors, already famous in Italy, are committed to making custom-made clothes for passing tourists that day to pick up during the arrival and departure train intervals or after a beautiful night spent in a hotel.

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Scenari e fermenti di Bologna | Scenarios and ferment of Bologna

And above all, it is a Bologna that wants to play the role of prima donna and that since the beginning of the century has dismantled the ancient city walls to «give air, healthiness and slenderness of movement» the historic center. But in reality not without less noble intentions, those of real estate speculation.

The same ones that, although partly masked by the need to provide jobs in winter for the unemployed masses of bricklaying laborers, are at the basis of the urban revolution work in the heart of the city. Work culminating in the dismantling of the characteristic «Mercato di Mezzo», now Via Rizzoli, began in 1911, a year before Guido Baglioni landed in the former palace of the Archiepiscopal Seminary opposite the Cathedral of St. Peter, to make it the headquarters of his new Grand Hotel.

The gutting represents a colossal real estate operation motivated by the need to widen Via Rizzoli, an urban stretch of the ancient Roman Via Emilia, to offer a more dignified perspective to the Two Towers, Bologna's antonomastic emblem. And this is thanks to the replacement of the modest but historic buildings existing on the southern side with modern buildings worthy of a city looking to the future, but whose considerable height partly extinguished the bold perception of momentum of the Asinelli tower which previously stood unchallenged on buildings of modest elevation.

Only a small group of enlightened spirits, environmentalists ante litteram, gave importance to these aspects, among whom the poet Gabriele D'Annunzio stood out. Together with some other anti-modernist intellectuals, he fought in vain against the demolition of three old towers, those of the Artenisi, Guidozagni, and Riccadonna families, which had emerged during the dismantling works. If appropriately isolated, they would have contributed, together with the adjacent Asinelli and Garisenda towers, to forming a group of five turreted piers in the city centre, unique and extraordinarily evocative. Unfortunately, their preservation, as well as that of the Lambertini palace and the headquarters of the ancient guilds of the Arts in Via Orefici and Via Caprarie, clashed with the mentality of the time and of the majority of Bolognese who wanted a city in step with the times and in line with the prevailing verb of modernism so as to make it a lively centre of trade in the name of Progress (with a capital «P»!) social and economic.

His spirit was announced to the people of Bologna on May 22nd when a cannon shot, fired from the hill of San Michele in Bosco, signaled the arrival of the first aircraft over Bologna, as part of the first aerial experiments in Italy. But unfortunately the device crashes near Calderara di Reno, a few kilometers from the city, and people have to postpone the excitement until an upcoming flight. The opportunity arose again on September 14th when Lieutenant Giulio Gavotti's plane flew, for the first time in history, over the center of Bologna during training sessions for the 640-kilometer Bologna-Venice-Rimini-Bologna air circuit, promoted by «Resto del Carlino» and «Le petit Journal» of Paris and scheduled for a few days later.

This time all the Bolognese remained glued to the sky following the noisy evolutions of the small aircraft. This is Bologna, which is changing, as the hotel's early years on Via Indipendenza unfold and the far-sighted spirit of Guido Baglioni operates. From a good entrepreneur, he almost certainly belonged to the ranks of those who applauded the city's urban renewal and economic growth. Years marked by the death, in his home on Via dell'Osservanza, of the eminent poet Giovanni Pascoli, which occurred on April 12, 1912, the same year Baglioni opened.

But these were above all years marked by strong dynamism and liveliness, but soon tormented by the apprehensions caused by the explosion of the First World War which saw Bologna in a militarily strategic position immediately on this side of the rear represented by the Po line. The city witnesses a constant coming and going of wounded soldiers or veterans from the front recovering from the tribulations of war and refugees from the inflamed lands of the north. For the first time in their history, the people of Bologna fear air raids by Austrian fighters and are therefore protecting one of the city's symbolic monuments, the Fountain of Neptune, with a wooden cage and bags of earth.

In this climate and with these scenarios, the newborn Baglioni took his first steps, opening his doors in 1912, the same year as the sinking of the Titanic. Instead, Baglioni's battleship, though not without a few storms during the tormented years of war, continued to safely sail the seas of hospitality, today celebrating its first century of existence.

Hidden treasures

To trace the history of such a significant stretch of city as the one home to the Hotel Baglioni, we must trace the origins of the entire city, to the colony that the Romans founded more than 2,000 years ago on the strategic edge of the hills that in the center of the Po Valley overlook the flat lands towards the Po. Of course we know that the building structures of the city of Bononia in the period before the birth of Christ and the advent of the imperial form of government were modest structures, made of wood and brick rather than stone.

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In search of the origins

Before retracing the extraordinary path of the centuries-old activity of the Grand Hotel Majestic «già Baglioni» in its noble headquarters on Via Indipendenza, it is appropriate, for the completeness of the historiographical framework, to take a step back to rediscover the roots of its original presence under the Two Towers. Its history, but perhaps it is worth mentioning its prehistory, began in the heart of Bologna in 1891 on Via Ugo Bassi at the corner with Via Oleari in the ancient Palazzo della Gabella (now the seat of the Bank of Rome), built in 1574-1577 based on a design by Domenico Tibaldi.

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