You’ve probably heard of Italian neighbourhoods in foreign cities, such as Little Italy in New York. But did you know there’s a tiny piece of London in Rome? Piccola Londra is a small, private street in the Flaminio neighbourhood with houses modelled after British example. I lived in this ‘Little London’ until this month, so I thought I’d introduce you to this photogenic, hidden gem.
Two rows of houses on either side of a cobblestone promenade, Victorian street lamps on wrought-iron gates, English post boxes, white marble steps leading up to a wooden doorway: the details of this little street in Roma-nord look anything but Italian. In fact, this part of the Flaminio district is called Little London because of its British style. But what is its history?
A British mayor with big plans
Piccola Londra was built at the beginning of the 20th century as part of a construction plan from 1909 that was meant to transform Rome into a European metropole. After the Eternal City had become Italy’s new capital in 1871, many ambitious plans for new neighbourhoods, roads, and public buildings popped up without a clear guideline or urban development plan. Ernesto Nathan, an English-Italian politician and mayor of Rome, tried to regulate these plans. His election was quite a revolution at the time: not only had he only obtained Italian citizenship when he was 40, but he was also Jewish (on November 22, 1907, the New York Times headlined: “Jew to be the mayor of Rome”), and he was the first mayor of Rome to not belong to the land-owning elite.
From Eternal City to modern metropole
To regulate the many new building plans and turn Rome into a modern, cosmopolitan city, Nathan came up with his Piano Regolatore di Roma in 1909, together with urban planner Edmondo Sanjust Teulada. This new plan, which had to prepare Rome for the 50th anniversary of Italy’s unification, took example from other European cities and included public transport, parks, and different types of residential areas. It was also the first time the city defined its different types of housing: a distinction was made, for example, between fabbricati (apartment complexes for families) and villini (low-rise buildings). Today, the addresses in Piccola Londra are still indicated by the term villino plus the number.
Flaminio was the first neighbourhood to be built according to this new Piano Regolatore. Seeing as the district north of the Aurelian walls was practically empty at the time, architect Quadrio Pirani was given a carte blanche to try out a new type of urban pattern between Via Flaminia and Viale del Vignola. Inspired by the English Liberty style, he created two rows of houses with stairs leading up to the front door and private gardens at the back. The street is closed off from traffic, which makes the experience complete: for a moment, you feel like you’ve left the city.
Little London as a movie set
Throughout the decades, Little London has remained largely untouched. Its photogenic houses star in many music videos, television commercials, and even movies (take a look at Levante’s Pezzo di Me, or the movie 10 Giorni Con Babbo Natale with Fabio De Luigi from 2020). In the years I lived here, after a while, I got used to seeing camera crews and production trucks in our little street and had fun spying on them from our tiny balcony.
If you decide to go on a trip to “London”, be sure to pass by 20 MQ Design e Derivati for a coffee or an original present, have dinner or icecream at Tiepolo, or visit an exhibition at the MAXXI Museum, only five minutes walking from Piccola Londra.
All images © 2021 Liza Karsemeijer
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