Parma tourist information
The first visit to Parma is out of curiosity. The next ones are out of sheer love. You just can’t resist the pervasive beauty and sensuality – meaning the satisfaction of all five senses – emanating from the Parisian-style boulevards, the elegant architecture, the scented air and the joie de vivre of this town. But first of all, as you probably know, Parma is the capital of great music: the most famous composer in the whole world, Giuseppe Verdi, was born in a small nearby town.
Add pleasure to pleasure: an aria from La Traviata and a taste of the local foods – which, just as the local music, are the best in the world. What foods? Two hints: Dop Prosciutto di Parma and Dop Parmigiano Reggiano.
The Teatro Regio (royal theatre), now specializing in Verdi’s operas, is a legend for music lovers and a crucible for all artists, even those at the top of their careers. It was commissioned by duchess Marie-Luise and built between 1821 and 1829, which accounts for the neoclassical style of its facade. No wonder that the 19th century was a great period for Parma. It was the century of music: Teatro Regio was built at that time, Roncole di Busseto gave birth to Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901) and Parma to Arturo Toscanini (1867-1957), and finally, Nicolò Paganini moved to Parma. To celebrate the latter event, the new Auditorium was named after the world-famous violin virtuoso and composer.
The symbol of the town is the Cathedral dominating medieval Piazza Duomo. Its remarkable structure is a specimen of a variation of the Romanesque style which is typical of the Po valley; it has an imposing facade, with a pitched roof and sculpted loggias. The nearby baptistery, built by the greatest medieval Italian sculptor and architect, Benedetto Antelami, is an octagon enclosed in Verona marble walls decorated by small loggias and niches filled with statues, which create an interplay of spaces and volumes.
Although it is located in a Renaissance palace (Palazzo Cusani, in Piazzale San Francesco), the House of Music is a completely new concept – actually, it was opened in late 2002 and it is the only structure of its kind in Italy. It combines advanced technology and concert lessons. If you are interested in the evolution of opera and theatre, you just can’t miss its multimedia and traditional museums, full of documents, exhibits, films and files.
Parma, of course, could not go without a monument to Giuseppe Verdi. It stands in Piazza della Pace, in front of the huge and unfinished Palazzo della Pilotta, a 16th-century building commissioned by Ranuccio I Farnese and originally meant to be a service centre with stables, barns, barracks, a theatre and a library. Today it houses the Galleria Nazionale, one of the first Italian galleries both for the number of pictures it contains and for their importance – it groups together paintings by Leonardo da Vinci, Beato Angelico, Correggio, Tintoretto and Giulio Romano. At the entrance of the building, the superb Teatro Farnese, one of the most charming historic theatres in the world, bears witness to the traditional magnificence of the local courts.
The inevitable souvenir from Parma is the typical perfume produced in this town, the world-famous Violetta di Parma. Violets were the favourite flower of Marie-Louise, Napoleon’s second wife and eventually Duchess of Parma and Guastalla from 1816 to 1847. It was upon her request that the friars from Convento dell'Annunciata began to extract an essence closely resembling the scent of the real flower. The formula was intended to be kept secret, for private use only, but today it is available to the public. It is no accident that Parma houses the first Italian Perfume Museum (Museo della profumeria), in Palazzo Borsari.
Leather works, too, are typical local handicrafts: here you can buy leather accessories with the exclusive “Made in Parma” brand. Via Cavour and Via Repubblica are the local shopping streets. At Christmas the town centre becomes crowded with market stalls selling lovely but inexpensive Christmas decorations and gifts.
Parma is the capital of the Italian “food valley”, the cradle of good cuisine and excellent wines. Its best products are Dop Prosciutto di Parma, Dop Culatello di Zibello (culatello is a special kind of ham), Dop Parmigiano Reggiano cheese, Felino Salami, the renowned Igp Boletus mushrooms from the Taro valley and Igt Fortana del Taro wine. For readers who are not familiar with the Italian acronyms for food and wine certifications, Dop stands for “Protected denomination of origin”, Igp means “Protected geographical indication” and Igt is “Regional geographical indication”. To be certified as dop Dop, Igt or Igp, a product must comply with strict standards guaranteeing its genuineness. But the products we have just mentioned are but the most popular ones. In and around Parma extremely rare homemade salami can be found, such as prete (literally, “priest”), which is similar to zampone (stuffed pig’s trotter) and is produced in the Colorno area.
Other examples are strolghino, a kind of salami, or gola (pig’s throat), which is top-quality pork lard left to mature on a wooden plank until it becomes pink with streaks of lean meat. Thinly sliced gola is eaten on hot bread. The typical products of the lowlands around Parma are culatello and a mild, egg-shaped salami called Spalla di San Secondo, which was much appreciated by Italian poet Gabriele D'Annunzio.
Local dishes are so many that it is impossible to give a list of them here: typical menus include several shapes of pasta or rice with savoury fillings (anolini, tortelli with a beet of pumpkin filling, rice rissoles with a pigeon meat filling), meat (pot roast, boiled meat, ground horse meat), mushrooms from the Apennines and several kinds of desserts (bearing distinctive French and Austrian influences).
