One of Rome’s most famous landmarks the Trevi fountain has finished getting a facelift. The romantic must-visit site had been in need of a makeover
ADVERTISEMENTOne of Rome’s most famous landmarks the Trevi fountain has finished getting a facelift.
The romantic must-visit site had been in need of a makeover as it is tramped around by millions of people every year.
Fashion house Fendi stumped up the cash and garnered the kudos for the project, at 17 months the biggest restoration in the fountain’s 252-year-history.
Legend has it that coins thrown into the fountain’s pristine waters ensure the thrower returns to Rome one day. Fendi will have similar high hopes of an advertising bonanza.
“It is a fountain that draws the water from an aqueduct, the Virgin Aqueduct, which has always been in use since 19 B.C. when Agrippa brought it to this site. It’s called Trevi as it was at the meeting point of three streets,” says Rome’s Cultural Heritage Superintendent Claudio Parisi.
The project has cost Fendi over two million euros, and is one of the more high-profile examples of Italy using private companies to patch up its architectural heritage as public money dries up.
Other companies are paying for the restoration of the Collissieum, for example, or the Pompei ruins.