The history of the Golden Palace
Palazzo Toro: an exemplary building, a model of architecture
When it was built in the period following the Second World War, “Palazzo Toro”, which now houses Turin’s only five-star luxury hotel, the Golden Palace, was cited in the most important books on architecture. It was an exemplary building both for its conception and for its structural features, and pictures of it appeared everywhere.
Modern, faced in stone, and with a great number of windows (one for each internal door, it was said), Palazzo Toro was one of the jewels of the Decker architectural firm, one of the city’s most in view at the time, and the best technicians and craftsmen of those years were involved in building it. It was one of the city’s first buildings to have lifts with automatic doors and air conditioning plants.
Thought through in every detail, it had an internal well to provide a regular source of cooling water for the air conditioning plants, and even paper shades placed between two panes of glass that could be manoeuvred from inside, according to a style in vogue in Nordic countries.
The statues placed outside the building at the sides of the future Golden Palace hotel’s entrance were designed and modelled in plaster by the sculptor Umberto Baglioni, a teacher at Turin’s Accademia Albertina (Scalea 1893 – Turin 1965), who had the stone carvings executed by the sculptor Giovanni Chissotti (Turin 1911 – 1996). The two works, in grey stone from Lake Maggiore, represent Fertility and Abundance.
The three statues of the fountain located in the *Golden Palace hotel’s outdoor dining area, depicting the Birth of Venus, are by Michele Guerrisi, a Calabrian sculptor and art critic (1893 – 1963) who also taught at the art academies of Rome and Turin.