A “New” Sacro Monte | Municipality of Varese

Shrine of water: A narration of water’s vital and determinant role for the entire Lombardian territory, from the great lakes of Garda, Como, Maggiore and Iseo to the thriving rivers Ticino, Adda and Oglio, from springs to fountains and artificial canals which permeate Lombardy and constitute an indispensable pivot for agricultural, urban and entrepreneurial development.

Shrine of flora: Lombardy has always been a true cornucopia of vegetable species, with a variety of specimens exalted by the ever-changing territory layout that is simultaneously alpine, pre-alpine and Padanian: not only olive trees of Western Garda, cereals, legumes and fruit trees, but also rare flowers such as the regal columbines and the elegiac swampland gladioluses.

Shrine of fauna: A station dedicated to the reappearance of animals no longer confined in the representations of popular imagery, but physically sighted and surveyed in the Lombardian territory (bears, wolves, lynxes etc.). We’re obviously talking about protected species that go along the millions of raised bovines, pigs, gallinaceous and sheep that contribute in an essential way to the economic wealth of Lombardy.

Shrine of the landscape: In this last station is taken into account the heterogenous marvel of a region “hosting” the snowy stretches of Mount Ros or the magnificence of floating pearls such as Isola Bella of Lake Maggiore or Montisola of the Iseo Lake. Habitat characterized by emotional human integrations within the natural landscape, spanning from Mantuan rice fields to the horticultural fields of the Comasco, from the Briantea Brughiera to the Ticino-based vineyards, from the ethereal Milanese skyline to the sumptuous square of Vigevano.