Portrait·2 min
Stories from the lake
Stories of the lake: its trades, winds, cooking, architecture and life out of season.
31stories
Story·2 min
Missoltini, the fish preserved in the sun
Shad are caught in summer, dried in the sun and wind and pressed into tins with bay leaves, to be eaten in the months that follow.
Feature·2 min
Como silk
Como has worked silk for centuries: in the district the thread that arrives from Asia is twisted, woven, dyed and printed, mostly for fashion houses.
Feature·2 min
Palazzo Terragni, rationalism beside the cathedral
In 1936 Giuseppe Terragni completed the Casa del Fascio in Como, now Palazzo Terragni: a rationalist building in white marble fifty metres from the apse of the cathedral.
Story·3 min
Breva and Tivano, the lake's breezes
The Tivano blows from the north in the early hours; the Breva blows up the lake from the south during the day. Their daily pattern depends on the weather and the season.
Season·3 min
Lake Como in winter
In winter the museums of Como and Lecco, the Romanesque churches and the Brunate funicular stay open, while almost all the great gardens close until spring. The centre-lake ferry runs all year, with fewer sailings.
Story·4 min
Why the lake is shaped like a Y
A valley cut by ice, a massif in the middle and a branch with no outflow: the geography of Lake Como and what it means for travellers.
Story·5 min
The villas and the microclimate
The lake's mass of water, the relief, the exposure and the soil explain why camellias, azaleas and olive trees grow on its shores, and why the villas have their gardens there.
Story·4 min
Two hundred years under steam
On 16 August 1826 a twelve-horsepower paddle boat left Como for Domaso. People have travelled the lake by boat ever since, and the routes of those first services are still today's.
Feature·3 min
The Regina, the road of the western shore
The Regina road, from Como to the Swiss border: a route of Roman origin, a name linked to Raetia or to Queen Theodelinda, one lane each way and the Tremezzina bypass in tunnels.
Portrait·6 min
The chancellor on the lake
Between 1957 and 1966 Konrad Adenauer spent eighteen holidays at Cadenabbia. From 1959 his house was an almost empty villa on the hill, furnished from the nearby hotels: he governed from it, played bocce, and walked to Mass on Sundays.
Story·7 min
The musicians' lake
A singer whose villa looked like La Scala, a composer in love on the opposite shore, a retired ballerina and a publisher who had Verdi to stay at his villa. In the nineteenth century musicians, singers and dancers came to the Lario to rest between seasons at Milan's theatres.
Feature·5 min
The olive coast
Oliveto Lario takes its name from the olive, and for centuries the oil of this stretch of the Lecco branch burned in the lamps on Saint Ambrose's tomb. Today it has a protected designation, rules that forbid calling it “superior”, and a path that runs through the groves.
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