Rolli e Guzzi
A hundred years of Genoese history, lived in the saddle. A journey through the Palazzi dei Rolli aboard historic and modern Moto Guzzi motorcycles, celebrating the centenary of the motorcycle maker founded in Genoa in 1921.
01A century of Genoese history
In March 1921 Carlo Guzzi and Giorgio Parodi founded Moto Guzzi in Genoa, destined to become one of the longest-running and best-loved motorcycle makers in the world. A hundred years later, in 2021, Renovatio told this anniversary by weaving together the history of Moto Guzzi with that of another Genoese symbol: the Palazzi dei Rolli, inscribed by UNESCO on the World Heritage List in 2006.
As the Flemish diplomat and painter Peter Paul Rubens wrote in 1622, dedicating to those palaces a famous illustrated book published in Antwerp, the Rolli are the official list of Genoese residences deemed worthy of hosting ambassadors, princes and lords: the physical manifestation of an aristocratic Republic that, between the 16th and 17th centuries, financially governed the world. The historian Fernand Braudel called that era “the century of the Genoese”.
02In the saddle among the palaces
For the centenary, a group of historic and modern Moto Guzzi motorcycles rode through Genoa, from Strada Nuova — the beating heart of the Rolli system — to the suburban villas surrounding the city, in a story told in two voices: that of the engine and that of art. Among the stops, Villa Tobia Pallavicino, known as Villa delle Peschiere for the ponds scattered across its garden, built in the mid-16th century to a design by Galeazzo Alessi and frescoed by Giovanni Battista Castello, il Bergamasco, with the Stories of Ulysses: a masterpiece that over the centuries hosted figures such as Richard Cromwell, Victor Amadeus II of Savoy and Charles Dickens.
The project was carried out in collaboration with the Associazione Giorgio Parodi, the University of Genoa and the scientific coordination of Giacomo Montanari, as part of the event Rolli Days Live&Digital, which in 2021 paired in-person visits with a rich program of digital content to reach a wider audience, among motorcycling and art-history enthusiasts.
03The story on video
Rolli Days Live&Digital — Moto Guzzi
«Genoa seen from the sea is one of the most beautiful things one can see in the world.»
Guy de Maupassant