Numerous beautiful manors and residences along the Wine Road were built in the traditional Oltradige construction style
Image gallery: Oltradige construction style
The so-called “Überetscher Stil”, the Oltradige construction style, skilfully combines architectonic influences from the North and the South, especially from Tuscany. The late-Gothic construction style is characterised by the charming details of Italian Renaissance: Oriels and turrets, outside staircases and crenellated walls, mullioned windows and columned arcades embellish the single buildings. They usually also feature an inner courtyard, elaborately adorned portals and a beautiful loggia. Inside, the rooms are symmetrically arranged around a large hall or hallway.
In the 17th century, at the time of Claudia de Medici - Regent of the Austrian County of Tyrol - and her son Ferdinand Charles, Archduke of Austria, the Oltradige construction style had its heyday. Back then, numerous residences and manors were built or refurbished in the villages along the South Tyrolean Wine Road. The architects and masons came mostly from Italian regions, so the playful architectonic elements from the South found their way into the more severe northern construction style and created - in an exemplary symbiosis - a unique style.
The term “Überetscher Stil”, however, dates back to the art historian Josef Weingartner (1885 - 1957) since this style of architecture can be found almost exclusively in the Oltradige area known as “Überetsch” and along the Wine Road. Around 1900, the Oltradige construction style, one of the most interesting periods of South Tyrolean architecture history, was reinterpreted as the so-called “Heimatstil” (homeland style). At the Fin de Siècle, the South Tyrolean construction company Much & Lun erected many buildings between Merano and Bolzano, among them also the Bolzano Municipal Museum, by using single elements of the Oltradige construction style.
