Experiences in Bolzano/Bozen

FC Südtirol is Italy’s northernmost professional football club and the only one in the vast geographic area between Verona and Trento. As the name suggests, FC Südtirol represents an entire territory, the Autonomous Province of Bolzano. Therefore it serves as an integration model for the three language groups based in South Tyrol: Italian, German and Ladin.
The club recently celebrated its 25th anniversary. Due to the constant growth and a highly professional management, FC Südtirol is considered as a role model in Italian football. The recently refurbished Stadio Druso in Bolzano is the home of FC Südtirol. The stadium is located in the center of the city and can be easily reached on foot and by bike. The completion of the new
Stadio ‘Druso’ is not only a milestone in the club’s history, but also offers a new venue for the three language groups to cheer together for the FCS!

Match schedules and info: 
www.fc-suedtirol.com/calendario

Like every city Bolzano too faces the fast pace of urban life. However, with just a few steps you can leave your stress behind and immerse yourself in the peaceful tranquillity of famous walks.

Guncina and S.Osvaldo, for example, completed at the end of 1800, are well renowned routes gently climbing through Mediterranean vegetation up to the top of the surrounding hills and offering stunning views over the city.
Lungotalvera Bolzano and Lungotalvera San Quirino are immersed in the lush Petrarca Park and meadows along the Talvera river. These walks are right adjacent to the city centre and provide an opportunity to practice various sports and recreational activities.

Download the paths: Promenades in Bolzano

Walther von der Vogelweide's statue was built using local marble by Heinrich Natter, a sculptor from Vinschgau, in 1889. the statue was temporarily removed from ist previous setting during the fascist government (Rosegger Parc) to be returned to ist original spot which had been intenden for it back in 1985.

Palais Campofranco was built in the second half of the 18th century. During the following century, it was the residence of the Archduke Ranieri Joseph of Austria and his wife, Princess Elisabeth of Savoy. The emblem of the Palace is its monumental ginko biloba tree, a gift for Empress Elisabeth of Austria, more commonly known as Princess Sissi, from her uncle Heinrich.

A change that preserves both the environment and the past of the building. This is the vision that nurtured the Palais Campofranco’s rebirth, built up from its historical foundations into a tribute to the territory through the creative use of smart technologies and natural energy sources.

The inner court of the Palais, with its impressive ginkgo tree as a centrepiece, is open all year round to give the palace a central role in Bolzano’s city life.

For generations Birra FORST, with passion and expertise, has been committed to preserving the pleasure of the art of brewing, offering FORST specialties that have always maintained the highest standards of quality.

A company strongly linked to its land, values and traditions, growing in full respect for nature and the environment.

The desire to preserve the brewing culture and the attention to detail that can be felt throughout the company are also perceived in the many FORST premises, where the beer enthusiast can experience them in a convivial atmosphere.

Closely linked to its places and people, Birra FORST is committed to the community with a strong sense of social responsibility, which takes shape in the support of numerous organizations and associations, throughout the country.

Located at the southern-western outskirts of Bolzano/Bozen, this castle is considered one of the emblems of South Tyrol. The original name "Formigar" stems from the Latin word "formicaria". From the 10th century a.d. the castle belonged to the Prince-Bishop of Trento, while during the second half of the 15th century Duke Sigismond , Count of Tirol, bought it and transformed it into the biggest and most prestigious of his castles naming it Sigmundskron (Sigismonds' crown). At the present date it has become the Mountain Museum of Reinhold Messner MMM Firmian.

History
If you were ever to wonder what someone from the Don Bosco
neighbourhood looks like, then simply hit up Fabio Gambaroni, who
was born and brought up here. Back in the day, he and his grandmother
bought his first watch at the Juwelier Resia, then owned by
Elena Mittempergher, and who shared the premises with a watchmaker.
A small, simple range of products stood to attention: yellow
gold necklaces, silver bracelets for men, and some watches. Fabio
Gambaroni took over the shop in 1993 when he was only 24. He
loves his job and has been serving people on his own ever since.
Stand-out traits
Talking is something Fabio is good at, be it for a chat or when advising
potential customers. If there’s a request, he’ll see to it, is what
he says with a big smile on his face. His attitude and the simple,
stylish interiors are what make the store so appealing in the first
place. He’s not interested in competing against the other, big dealers
– he’d much rather focus on slipping between the cracks they
leave open, providing traditional and extraordinary items of jewellery.
He’s also happy to change watches’ batteries or refer people to
the right person if more complex repairs are required.

Housed in the Mercantile Building, formerly the seat of the prestigious Mercantile Court founded in 1653, the museum details the economic history of the town. The chronological tour winds between conference halls, the chancellery, the hall of honour with its original furniture, documents, paintings and original artistic pieces. Also the ancient cellars of the building can be visited.

Foto Forum gallery is a platform for photography. With exhibitions and other activities, communicative, creative and artistic positions in photography are presented and conveyed. The exhibition programme provides insights into current photography with a broad spectrum of artistic and documentary works by photographers from Tyrol and abroad. Flashbacks to highlights of the history of photography round off how the gallery provides information.

Piazza Gries, with the architectural complex of the Abbey of Benedettini di Muri-Gries on the right handside, is right in the middle of the quarter. The monastery, initially hosting Agostinian monks (1406), was damaged by peasant revolts in 1525 and destroyed during the Napoleonic wars. It was suppressed by the Bavarian government in 1807 and donated by the Austrian Emperor to Benedectine Muri Monks (Switzerland) in 1845. The oldest centre is the castle, built by the Morit-Greifenstein Counts in 1200, and whose original 'mastio' (tower) today is the church's bell tower. It hosts one of the heaviest bells in Alto Adige (5,026 kg).

The Galerie Prisma is the central meeting-place for art and culture. Within the walls of the "German House" in the Weggensteinstrasse in Bozen / Bolzano – a location rich in history – one finds the 160-square-meter vaulted hall of the SKB gallery. Not only readings, symposia, and other cultural events are held here at the gallery, but about ten exhibitions also take place annually. The focus is on group and individual exhibitions of the members.

One of the most typical streets of the City centre, adorned with pretty plaques in wrought iron, various typical restaurants and the historical Hotel Luna Mondschein. At the ent of the street, heading north you'll find the Museum of Natural Science, housed in the administrative centre of the Emperor and Count of Tyrol Maximilian I (built in 1512). Near the Museum you'll also find the historic Restaurants "Weißes Rössl" and "Batzenhäusl" favoured by various artists.

From the smallest pocket knife to the most extraordinary slicer, there is nothing in these workshops that is not of the highest quality. Knives, scissors, kitchen utensils, sharp objects for work, for gifts, for collectors; in the Lorenzi workshops you can admire hundreds of different objects, all produced in the finest craftsmanship. Since 1948, the Lorenzi family has been synonymous with refinement and professionalism, and entering the shops in Via Bottai 28 and Via Goethe 36 is like entering a world of curiosity that is truly exciting.

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Eccel Decorona - from 1907 to today

In the year 1907, under the Bolzano arcade, the skilled textile merchant Marius Eccel senior opened his first shop together with his wife Maria Eccel Schaller.

His descendants were and still are born merchants. Each of Marius Eccel junior's sons set up his own business. Since 1954, the Eccel Decorona bed linen shop has had its headquarters in the Decorona porch house in Bolzano.

Walter Eccel ran it until 2003. Today, his son Andreas Eccel runs the company. In 2002, a sales outlet was also opened in Brunico.

Marius Eccel senior, the progenitor of a dynasty of traders, was originally from Borgo di Valsugana. At that time, at the turn of the century, merchants were also 'travelling salesmen'. They travelled by carriage out of the village, took orders and made deliveries to customers. The business grew; each grandson specialised in a different sector of the textile field. Eccel Decorona concentrated on sheets, bedclothes and towels.

Luca Pintimalli is a bona fide coffee maestro, a passion he has
nurtured from a very early age all thanks to his mother. She’d discovered
the café boasting its very own roastery. It was love at first
sight. “The first exclusive roastery in Bolzano, a universe of green
coffee beans and an aroma which wafted across the entire neighbourhood.”
His parents purchased Tropical Caffè in 1981 from the
previous owners, who’d been running it for two generations in the
Europa-Novacella neighbourhood. Luca was brought up between
jute coffee bags and behind the shop’s counter. He contributed
more to the business as his mother, Nadia, started to decline due
to a severe sickness; in 2014, she passed away, and Luca decided to
interrupt his studies in Padova and Trento to dive headfirst into the
universe of coffee. He never looked back and was swept away by the
world of coffee, raw materials, and supply chains, making him the
coffee expert he is today.
Your senses come alive upon crossing the tiny café’s door. You’re
enveloped in a sweet, heady aroma of coffee, and your gaze sweeps
over the coffee grinders and all the other necessary equipment, select chocolate pralines, Italian sugared almonds, and rare sweets,
until it rests on the valuable coffee beans from the four corners of
the world. Aha! The culprits of that wonderful aroma. The café is a
meeting point for all coffee gourmands from the neighbourhood
and the city at large. If you fancy tasting the same coffee prepared
using different methods – from an espresso machine through a
French press, paper filter to much, much more, you’re in coffee Eldorado.
You can also purchase exclusive coffee-based gifts or simply
find out more about the vast and diverse world of coffee.

The Dominican order established itself in Bolzano/Bozen in 1272 and built a church with a single nave inside a vast convent which branches off into different chapels, some of which have been lying in ruins, and a beautiful cloister. A part of the ancient structure houses the Music Academy shich, indidentally, Hosts the prestigious international piano competition Ferruccio Busoni. Also present is the Stadtgalerie, an art gallery which holds different exhibitions and other important cultural Events. The church has gothic archways, as well as baroque elements from the 17th and 18th century (such as the altar piece of Guercino to the left of the Major altar, which was bought by the merchants of Bolzano). The church preserves prestigious examples of paintings from Bolzano from the 14th century which can be found on the oriental side of the coister and on the western wall of the Church, but the real artistic jewel of the building is the Chapel of St. John, the Long and narrow side chapel which holds the cycle of frescoes of those painters who took Giotto es their role model, the so called "School of Giotto". Of particular interest are those scenes from the life of St. Nicholas on the last part of the oriental qall, and the fresco of the "Triumph over death " in the firs part of the same wall, the flight from Egypt on the western wall and the torture of St. Bartholomew on the northern wall. The entire chapel, decorated with individual frescoes of various themes, is a splendid example of 14th century art as practised in the Region. In the nearby coister you can also admire some frescoes by Friedrich Pacher which go back as far as 496.

First opened in 1905, it holds one of the biggest historic-artistic collections in South Tyrol: works of arts from the Middle Ages until the 20th century, Romansque Madonna's and crosses, winged gothic altars and the famous art section of popular art with the gothic "Stuben", the original folk costumes and masks.

The Santo Sepolcro Church also known as the Church of Calvary, can be reached in about 20 minutes following the forest path that starts from via Santa Geltrude or from the road that goes up from via Piè di Virgolo. A handful of minutes, following the via crucis, and here we are, immersed in the forest. From here you can enjoy a wonderful panoramic view over Bolzano and the Sciliar plateau.

The church, built between 1683 and 1684, has been for centuries a place of pilgrimage. On the right, looking at the entrance of the church, there is a chapel that contains the fountain with Christ. In past times couples used to do small fertility rites to become a child. The elders of Virgolo still remember a popular belief who said that children came into the world under the fountain of the chapel and weren't brought by the stork.

The church has been restored in recent times, but the countless love-graffiti are safe. Pilgrims and lovers engraved the walls of the sepulchre with love messages from the 18th century up to our days and it is a real emotion to read those messages that overlap over the centuries and tell the story of hundreds of people through a heart, a flower, a name, a date or a promise of love.

Haselburg Castle is accessible to the general public as a restaurant and as a party and reception venue (opening times of the restaurant). To get there you have to pass through the neighbourhood of Haslach: a steep path will take you to the rocky lookout on which the castle is perched (with parking space). Nice view on the Etsch valley and on Bolzano/Bozen itself looking North (Salten plateau, Sarntal Valley, Ritten). It contains frescoes from 1500.

 

The art gallery "Kleine Galerie - Piccola Galleria" offers local artists the possibility to expose their works.

The XIII century castle, situated right behind the hystoric city centre, is surrounded by fields of the fine Lagrein grapevines and has stunning views of the Rosengarten. It was renovated in the 1980s and transformed into a conference and exhibition centre. It is certainly the most interesting and exclusive complex, ideal for housing conferences, seminars, banquets, concerts, cultural events and exhibitions. The beautiful interiors, with stunning frescoes, have all the modern features and conference facilities. The view of the castle from the river walk nearby is particularly impressive. Adjacent parking.

The castle is a congress centre and open for visitors only during events and exhibitions.

It is the Cathedral of the Bolzano Bozen- Bressanone Brixen Diocese. It conceals the remains of an early Christian, Medieval and Romanesque (1180) basilica. A hundred years later works are commenced to build a new imposing building which is completed around 1420 by combining the expertise of workers of Lombardy with the gothic style brought by the Swabian expertise over the decades. The bell tower stand over the square, 65 metres tall, with a spire in openwork in sandstone by the Swabian architect Hans Lutz von Schussenried, who completed it between 1501 and 1519. To see: the cross built in Veronese style, the "Wine door", the Romanesque Portal with porch lions, the rose window, the fresco "Virgin with child" credited to Friedrich Pacher, inside the gothic pulpit, the baroque Chapel of the Three Maries.

History
When it first opened at the end of the 1960s, the store was a third
of its current space. Gianni Guerra opened the opticians with wife
Vanda and their son Luca – the current owner – studied optometry
at university to then join the family business in 1995. Gianni also realised
his dream and received the master optician diploma 30 years
after his journeyman’s examination. Luca’s wife Arabella also joined
the company a few years later, just one of the many additions to the
ever-growing company.
Stand-out traits
Lucas and Arabella purchased an automatic phoropter at a trade fair
three years ago to provide high-precision results in vision measurement
and lens determination. The smart vision tester takes up one
of the rooms in the back of the store and has proved to be immensely
helpful when assessing the eyesight of children and the elderly.
On top of that, the store is the only authorised Cartier concessionaire
in South Tyrol. An important recognition as the luxury Parisian
brand selects its partners following strict criteria.

The Museum informs about movie- and tvtecnology of the local cinema’s history. It presents projection machines of the past, video cameras, editing machines, flatbed editors, projectors, films etc. as well as historic documents, posters and documentary films. It proposes also film festivals, conferences and didactic activities, castings.

Josef Kreuzer, late judge, businessman and art collector of Bozen/Bolzano, donated in January 2017 in his testament his building in the historical city center with a collection of more than 1.500 artworks of about 300 artists of South Tyrol, Tyrol and the Trentino to the Autonomous Province of Bozen/Bolzano. The only condition for this gift was to make the building and the artworks accessible to the public as a museum. On the ground floor of the building is situated the Art Space Eccel Kreuzer, a place for temporary exhibitions.

This is one of the most suggestive places in town, thanks to its long and curved shape and colourful fruit and vegetable market. Neptune's Fountain is waiting for you, a masterpiece signed by Joachim Reis, based on the model of Georg Mayr from Völs (1745). On the opposite corner a plaque reminds visitors of the existence of the "Zur Sonne" Hotel where, among others, even Johann Wolfgang Goethe, Emperor Joseph II and the German literate and philospher Johann Gottfried Herder stayed.

Located in Piazza delle Erbe / Obstplatz, right in the gastronomic heart of the city, Butcher's shop Egger pampers all meat lovers with tasted and genuine products.

The Franciscan order settles in town in 1221; the present building Dates back to the rist haf of the 14th century, but the original ceiling, flat and with a choir of polygonal shape, has been replaces by a vaulted ceiling from the 15th century. The coister is a beautiful example of gothic art, which replaces the Romanesque style in which the rest of the building was built; there are different frescoes from various periods of time, including some from Giotto's School and some from the 17th and 18th century. The church still preserves an astounding wooden altar by Hans Klocker of Brixen (painted Wood - 1500) which was dedicated to the Nativity Scene. The choir of the church is embellished by the modern glass panels of Widmoser.

The oldest glacier mummy in the world, Ötzi the Iceman, has found his last resting place at the South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology. Dating from the Copper Age (5,300 years old), he can been seen with his original clothing and equipment. Each year there are different special exhibitions on archaeological topics from South Tyrol to supplement the permanent display.

 

More about Ötzi and the museum

The square is surrounded by beautiful buildings of the Town Hall on the southern side (in neo-baroque style, with an interesting frescoes inside) and by Amonn House on the eastern side (facade decorated with stucco).