Seminars and company events
Villa Marigola hosts congresses, seminars, conferences and company dinners for up to 160 people seated in its main hall, with a dining room for 140 and gardens that take 300 guests. The villa stands on a headland at San Terenzo di Lerici, in the province of La Spezia, and serves as the congress center of Crédit Agricole Italia, the bank that took over the Cassa di Risparmio della Spezia.
The main hall is a square room of 13.5 by 13.5 meters with a 4.5-meter ceiling and two doors that open onto the outside. It comes equipped for meetings: a six-seat speaker table with microphones, two wireless handheld microphones, two large screens, images relayed to the speaker table and to monitors in the other rooms and corridors, and audiovisual recording. Simultaneous translation can be set up on request in two interpreter booths. Breakout rooms are linked to the hall by audio and video, so a plenary can split into working groups without losing the feed.
Beyond conferences, the villa is offered for product launches and promotional events, photo and television shoots, exhibitions, concerts and gala dinners. An exhibition area of about 180 square meters on the first floor can be extended to the ground floor for sponsor stands or a show.
Weddings and receptions
Wedding banquets and ceremonies are part of the official offer. The dining room seats 140 guests and the garden holds 300, which allows a dinner indoors or a larger reception outside in good weather. The terrace, the forecourt with its view over the gulf and the Italian gardens give several settings for an aperitif or photographs.
Rooms and capacities
The main hall seats 160. A smaller room seats 40 and works for a board meeting or a working group. The dining room seats 140 and has a modern kitchen with an adjoining preparation room and a service room for plating. The garden takes 300 guests. Heating runs through the whole building, and the main hall is air-conditioned in summer. The villa, the gardens, the car parks and the access drive are lit at night.
Catering
The dining room has its own professional kitchen and service rooms. The official site does not say whether catering is in-house or provided by a chosen caterer, so organizers should ask when they request a quote.
History and setting
The original building dates from the eighteenth century and was the summer residence of the Ollandini marquises. Its large terrace held a Ligurian citrus garden of citrons, lemons, chinotto and oranges, and the estate ran down in olive groves and vines to the beach, where stands the white house linked to the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley. From the middle of the nineteenth century the garden took a romantic form, with paths that end on natural balconies over the Gulf of Lerici, its castle and its islands. The bay is known as the Gulf of Poets after Byron and Shelley, and the Cinque Terre are close by for a free afternoon after the sessions. The mild local climate allows events in every season.
Getting there
The park opens from the coastal road between Lerici and San Terenzo, Via Biaggini, through an automatic gate controlled by the front desk. A tree-lined drive of 400 meters leads to a forecourt of about 500 square meters with a lookout over the gulf and two car parks for about 50 cars. By road, take the A12 Genoa to Livorno or the A15 Parma to La Spezia and exit at Santo Stefano Magra toward Lerici. Pisa airport is about 40 minutes away, Genoa about one hour, and Milan Linate or Malpensa about two hours.
