In 1891, Giacomo Puccini, after a Summer stay with a certain Andreozzi, rented two rooms from Venanzio Barsuglia, “a guard of Don Carlos” di Borbone, as reported by Puccini himself. It was a humble tower-house on Lake Massaciuccoli: three simple rooms upstairs with shared kitchen and a stable on the ground floor.

Torre del Lago since then represents an emblematic place in the life of Puccini, a site and refuge inspiring the majority of his most famous operas.

After the success of Manon Lescaut, Puccini moved to the nearby residence of Count Grottanelli, where he remained until the construction of the Villa Puccini, completed in the Spring of 1900.

When work had already begun on the villa of Chiatri, Puccini had the opportunity to buy the old tower-house: the project to demolish the old building retaining only the foundations of the tower was a collaborative effort of the Maestro (“various architects including me”), with Luigi De Servi, Plinio Nomellini and ingegner Giuseppe Puccinelli.

The villa has a traditional cubical, symmetrical composition and a clear division of functions: an ornamental bay window in glass and iron is the connecting element between the entrance of the villa and the garden that borders the building.

Emblematic of the taste of the time, the garden, which originally was lapped by the lake, followed an irregular shape, outlined by flower beds adorned with bizarre stones with palm trees and hedges that shielded and created prospects with great visual effects.

The rigour of the architectural structure contrasted with the eclectic interior, fruit of the collaboration between Puccini, De Servi, Nomellini and Galileo Chini.

On 28 December, 1924 this stone was placed on the wall to the north, the one facing the street:

THE PEOPLE OF TORRE DEL LAGO PLACED THIS STONE
OUT OF DEVOTION
IN THE HOUSE WHERE WERE BORN
THE INNUMERABLE CREATURES OF DREAM
THAT
GIACOMO PUCCINI
DREW FOR HIS IMMORTAL SPIRIT