Villa Madre Cabrini

The original part of the villa, dating to the early 18th century as the vaulted entrance and the decorated ceilings of the piano nobile suggest, was built as a suburban villa near the 16th century church of Saint Anne, alongside the steep walkway (Italian: salita; Ligurian: crêuza) linking Portello to Mura delle Chiappe, midway in between the Barbarossa Walls and the 17-century New Walls, giving impulse to the urbanization of an area that used to be rural at the time. The area was called Bachernia, a phytonym indicating the presence of berries ("bacche" in Ligurian and Italian language).[5]

In the 19th century, the property of the aristocratic Acquarone family, the villa was enriched and elevated with the addition of a fourth story, and was then known as "Villa Acquarone" or "Palazzo Acquarone",[6] still surrounded by a large park, part of which was landscaped and part used for dairy farming. The milk produced was sold in the historical "vaccheria" (dairy shop) located near the uphill station of the Sant'Anna funicular in via Agostino Bertani, an important contribution to the life of the neighborhood as the area surrounding Genoa was not suitable for dairy farming and milk had to be imported.[7]

In the last decade of the century, the villa and its owner, Pietro Acquarone, II Count d'Acquarone, played a key role in the establishment of the economically and culturally active Via Acquarone neighborhood, to the north of the 19th-century Circonvallazione a Monte (Italian for "mountain ringway"), which reduced the size of the park to make way to the edification of low-rise residential buildings in the newly constructed Corso Paganini. Urban expansion to the north of Ponte Caffaro, however, could not take place without the edification at the lower end of the park of the villa of a high wall to support the access road, a risky undertaking for the technology of the time. Pietro Acquarone decided to take action and obtained permission from the Municipality to build the wall at his sole risk, then transferred the property of the wall – and the associated risks – to the Municipality five years later.[8]

At turn of 20th century, the villa received its current appearance under the supervision of Luigi Filippo d'Acquarone, III Count d'Acquarone, with the addition of the fifth story and the remodeling of the facade in the Gothic revival and Eclectic styles popular in Genoa at the time.[9]

In 1890, the villa was the birthplace of Pietro d'Acquarone, I Duke d'Acquarone, who ended a successful military career in 1924 with the active rank of Brigade General, became a businessman, Senator of the Kingdom of Italy and, most importantly, Minister to the Royal Household under Victor Emmanuel III of Italy from 1939 to 1944, in which capacity he played a major role in the downfall of Benito Mussolini on July 25th, 1943.[10][11][12][13]

In 1917, the villa was purchased by the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus founded by Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini M.S.C (1850–1917), the Italian-American "missionary of the emigrants", who died in the United States in the same year. The Sisters renamed the building "Villa Madre Cabrini" to honor their saint foundress and turned it into a renowned educational and cultural center, transferring there the boarding school established by the Saint Mother Cabrini in via Palestro in 1894.[14]

The educational complex was expanded in 1934–38 with the edification of a rationalist annex connected to the villa though an underground passage under Salita Bachernia commissioned by Sister Francesca Saverio Savona M.S.C. (1897–1950), who directed the school from 1931 until 1950. Sister Savona also supervised the restoration of the damage suffered by the villa during World War II.[15]

In the 1980s, the villa and the remainder of its park were sold and redeveloped into residential apartments. The annex and the portion of the park to the East of Salita Bachernia are currently in use as a public school, known as School San Paolo, with access from via Francesca Saverio Cabrini, next to the Elevator Magenta-Crocco. The school now hosts the Istituto Comprensivo Castelletto, including a Nursery School (Scuola dell'Infanzia), a Primary School (Scuola Elementare) and a Secondary School (Scuola Secondaria di Primo Grado).[16]