Mondello — spiaggia

The story

Until the early 20th century Mondello was a fishing village beside a marsh, hemmed in between Monte Pellegrino and Monte Gallo. The land was drained and the resort created by an Italian-Belgian company that from 1910 laid out the avenues and divided the land into plots for the summer villas of Palermo’s bourgeoisie.

In 1912 the Stabilimento Balneare was built on stilts over the water, in Liberty style, with its great central hall above the sea: it is the symbol of the beach and today houses a restaurant. Around it rose the Art Nouveau villas, many by the best architects of the day, still visible along the tree-lined avenues.

The pale sandy beach, roughly a kilometre and a half long, remains Palermo’s own city beach, with the tower and small harbour on the village side.

Why it is worth it

The water is clear and green, the sand fine, and the Liberty bathing pavilion out in the sea looks like something from a photograph a hundred years old. Walk the seafront to look at the villas with their floral decoration, then head towards the village for the little harbour, the fishermen and the tower. In summer it is real beach life; in winter it is where locals go to catch the sun at lunchtime.