Not only every house that I have furnished, not only every room that I have studiously composed, but every object that I have chosen and collected in the different ages of my life has always been for me a way of expression, a way of spiritual revelation, like any of my poems, like any of my dramas, like any of my political or military actions, like any of my testimonies of straight and unwavering faith.

Therefore, I dare to offer to the Italian people all that remains to me and all that I am from now on to acquire and to increase with my renewed work—not a rich legacy of inert wealth but a bare legacy of immortal spirit.

Already a vain celebrant of distinguished palaces and sumptuous villas, I have come to close my sadness and silence in this old farmhouse, not so much to humble myself as to put my virtue of creation and transfiguration to a more difficult test.

For everything here is created and transfigured by me.

Everything here shows the imprints of my style in the sense that I want to give it.

My love of Italy, my cult of memories, my aspiration to heroism, and my foreboding of the future homeland are manifested here in every pursuit of lines, in every agreement or disagreement of colors.

Do not the relics of our war bleed here? And do not the surviving stones of glorious cities speak or sing here?

Every rude wreck is set here like a rare gem.

The great tragedy of the ship ‘Puglia’ is placed in honor and light on the knoll, like the bloody shred of the slain heroic comrade in the oratory.

And here, not to gather dust but to live, are placed my study books, in such great numbers and of such value, that they perhaps surpass any other library of a solitary scholar.

Everything here is therefore a form of my mind, an aspect of my soul, a proof of my fervor.

As death will give my body to my beloved Italy, so may I preserve the best of my life in this offering to my beloved Italy.

(Gabriele d'Annunzio)

A century on from the donation of the Vittoriale degli Italiani, we cannot fail to look at the many presidents who have succeeded one another at the helm of the Foundation, right up to the present day and the leadership of Giordano Bruno Guerri, who, with the audacity and vitalism typical of Gabriele d'Annunzio himself - has faithfully followed the dictates he left behind and continues to make the Vittoriale a new and fertile subject of projects.

How can we fail to mention, in this sense, the reconstruction of the amphitheatre (now entirely in red Veronese marble), according to d'Annunzio's wishes, the continuous renovation of the museums that are an integral part of the residence: d 'Annunzio eroe, d'Annunzio segreto, l'automobile è femmina, up to the Museo Maroni, housed in the Casseretto of the Vittoriale and recently enriched with the Paglieri Collection.

The ‘book of living stones’, as Gabriele d'Annunzio used to call it, is a perpetual work of art that is being reconstructed brick by brick to complete what the Commander had conceived for himself but which was still, partially, in the making on the evening of 1 March 1938, the night he died.

Since that day, the house has remained intact. This is a rare example among international museum homes that, all too often, display remodelled rooms or non-original material. On the contrary, the Vittoriale continues to present itself as intact, though constantly changing, attracting the attention of hundreds of thousands of enthusiasts and onlookers every year (an estimated 300,000 in 2023, an increase of almost 10% over the previous year).

These figures are not surprising, since d'Annunzio's genius never leaves indifferent those who approach it. Defined by the writer and poet Piero Citati as ‘a liquid creature’, it is precisely in his being elusive that his eternal power lies. It is no coincidence that the writer from Abruzzo watches over his final resting place from the top of the Mausoleum, and it is, therefore, still possible to feel its presence in each of the more than ten thousand objects housed inside the Vittoriale.

Those who have already visited d'Annunzio's place par excellence know that, once welcomed into the Priory (the actual home of ‘Frate Gabriel prior’), one immediately enters to the right to begin a journey of discovery between rooms of different decorations and breath.

To the left, instead, access is barred. On recent occasions, however, the area between the Officina (the Poet's workroom) and the Labyrinth Corridor has opened to the public in all its splendour.

It was thus possible to enter the flats of the Vate's last companion, the pianist Luisa Baccara, and his housekeeper, Amélie Mazoyer. Two adjacent rooms for two women who were at first enemies, then accomplices in the common fate of having to/wanting to please the Commander in his every request. Here, then, the area known as the Clausura reveals a table still covered with the objects used to adorn the various ‘passing abbesses’ (occasional lovers), a room in which prominent personalities such as Georgij Čičerin, Elena Sangro, and Tamara de Lempicka stayed, and Baccara's study with its music sheets.

What is most striking about this side of the residence (which, by choice, is shown occasionally, as it is distant from the overall harmony that d'Annunzio gave to the rooms he inhabited) is the sinister immobility which makes the sudden departure of the two women, who left immediately after the poet's death, almost palpable.

All in all, a wing that is almost as beautiful and suspended as Enrico Mazzolani's Cantico del Sole ceramics, which superbly dominates a very elegant bathroom in violet tiling, a silent witness to a sumptuous past that is now double-shielded.