A well-behaved garden offers reassuring things: a path, a view, perhaps a fountain exactly where you expect it. At Bomarzo, a great stone face appears to have other plans.
Good. We could all use an afternoon in which the landscape gets the first word.
The Sacro Bosco sits near Bomarzo in northern Lazio. It was conceived in the sixteenth century by Pier Francesco Orsini, known as Vicino. Huge fantastical figures were carved from the rock already present in the woodland. The result is a place where nature and human imagination keep interrupting each other.
A Renaissance with a mischievous streak
Think of the Renaissance and you may picture measured proportions, balanced façades and the satisfying certainty of a straight line. Bomarzo gives you a more unruly conversation.
Here, enormous creatures and strange forms emerge among the trees. You turn a corner and have to reconsider the scale of your own body. Stone looks almost theatrical. The wood supplies the changing light.
I like to approach the place with a little intellectual modesty. Its imagery has prompted many interpretations, and a visitor does not need to solve every symbol to enjoy looking. Sometimes the useful question is simply: why would someone want to make a place that unsettles your expectations?
A garden can be a portrait of an imagination. This one has a strong personality.
Let the children lead the looking
Adults can turn a family visit into an examination without noticing. “Who remembers the date?” is rarely the beginning of a wonderful afternoon.
Try a different game. Each person chooses a figure and gives it a voice. What would it say? Is it guarding something, complaining about something, or waiting for someone who is very late?
Then return to the actual object. Which detail suggested that story? The mouth? The posture? The size? In a few minutes, you have moved from invention to careful observation. That is a useful skill in any museum, and children often arrive at it more easily than adults.
There is no need to climb the sculptures to make them interesting. They are already doing plenty of work.
Build the day around one good encounter
I would allow Bomarzo to be the centre of a leisurely outing, with time for a meal and a pause afterwards. Packing it between several other major stops risks turning an imaginative place into another timed appointment.
Check the park’s current opening arrangements, visitor rules and access information before setting out. A woodland visit also deserves footwear suited to the paths.
On the journey home, ask everyone which creature they would put in their own garden. The answers tend to reveal more than a photograph.
Personally, I would first consider what the neighbours might think. Then I would probably choose the enormous one.