This originally appeared in the New Yorker, November 23rd, 1991

Part of the palace used to belong to Gioacchino’s cousin & adoptive father, Giuseppe Tomasi (1896-1957), the last Prince of Lampedusa, who wrote the novel The Leopard. Lampedusa lived in this house for the final 12 years of his life. Over the past 3 decades or so Gioacchino has been buying from the scattered descendants of its original owners the remaining jigsaw pieces of it. Restoring the ruined palace proved a more herculean enterprise than he had initially imagined.

Only after 15 years of reconstruction was house completed, in 1981, the same year that Mirella, his first wife, died. The palace is schizophrenic. On its street face, on the Via Butera it is surrounded by & slum. Its other side is brilliant Mediterranean. A white and yellow stucco Louis XVI facade, sunny and inviting, overlooks the harbor & a 4-lane highway. Across the highway looms Luna Park, a year-round funfair.

You can read more at the New Yorker (subscription required).

Giuseppe Tomasi, Italy, Louis XVI, Luna Park, Mediterranean, New Yorker, Palermo, Prince of Lampedusa, Via Butera