Museum Villa Paolina 

The Villa Paolina (or Palazzo Paolina) is an historical building that belonged to Paolina Bonaparte, sister of Napoleon. 

The villa was built in 1822 on the seafront, the place (now called Piazza Shelley) where, according to legend, the sea returned the body of the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, who died that same year in the sea of Viareggio after a shipwreck; Paolina loved her poems very much and it is said that she chose the construction site precisely for this reason and because of its proximity to the sea. 

The villa, also called “The Refuge of Venus”, was occupied by the princess immediately after its construction to live close to the man she loved, the musician Giovanni Pacini. Paolina’s refuge after the death of her brother Napoleon, it was a place of culture as the princess loved to surround herself with artists and musicians. 

The villa, which with the expansion of the city over time, has now become an integral part of it, was reopened to the public after the restoration and houses the “Citizen Museums of Villa Paolina” and the art gallery dedicated to contemporary art. 

Visiting Hours
FROM 1 September TO 14 June 
FROM Wednesday TO Saturday FROM 15.30 TO 19.30 
FROM 15 June TO 31 August 
from Tuesday to Sunday FROM 18.00 TO 23.00 

Via Niccoló Machiavelli 2
55049 (LU) Viareggio
+39 584 961 076

17 min walk