Varallo and the Sacro Monte: The Stone Jerusalem in the Mountains

In 1491 the Franciscan friar Bernardino Caimi returned from the Holy Land with a visionary project: to recreate Jerusalem on the mountains of the Valsesia, so that those who could not afford the journey to Palestine could still walk the Stations of the Cross. The result is the Sacro Monte of Varallo, the first and most ambitious of the Piedmontese and Lombard Sacred Mountains now inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site: 44 chapels set across a wooded hill, each with scenes from the life of Christ realised with terracotta statues and frescoes by artists including Gaudenzio Ferrari.

A Sixteenth-Century Theatre of Faith

The Varallo chapels are not simple votive shrines: they are enclosed or open spaces with stage-set arrangements of life-size figures — over 800 statues — painted and dressed in real garments, placed against frescoed backdrops that extend the real space into illusionistic perspective. The technique, a forerunner of Baroque trompe-l'oeil, produces a disconcertingly realistic effect that still catches unprepared visitors off guard. The Crucifixion chapel, with its frescoes by Gaudenzio Ferrari, is one of the masterpieces of sixteenth-century Lombard art.

The Town of Varallo Below the Sacro Monte

Varallo is a small town of 7,000 inhabitants with an old centre walkable in an hour: the Calderini Civic Museum, the collegiate church of San Gaudenzio and the porticoed main street hold the visitor's attention before and after the climb to the Sacro Monte. A funicular links the centre to the hill in a few minutes; on foot the walk takes 30 minutes through the woods.

Seasons and Practicalities

The Sacro Monte is free to visit all year round; some chapels open only in summer. The best seasons are spring and autumn, when the surrounding woods deepen the experience. Varallo is reachable by bus from Novara in about an hour and a half, or by car from the A26 motorway, Romagnano Sesia exit.