Villa with a tormented life

Villa Geibel, owned by the German consul, Fünker Otto Karl Geibel, a member of an excellent Bavarian family.

Consul Geibel, a gentleman of refined style, had a splendid furnishing (paintings, statues, precious furniture, musical instruments and selected books) and his living room was a centre of San Remo's worldliness and culture. The interiors of the villa were the work of Vincenzo Achille Casella, a well-known stucco artist from Sanremo.

At the outbreak of the First World War, the villa, as it belonged to an enemy country citizen, was seized by the Italian Government, but at the end of the war the Geibel bought it back and shortly afterwards it had to be bought a third time after the Second World War: if this did not happen it was because Sanremo was occupied by the German forces.

However, at the end of the hostilities, the Geibel, which shared nothing of the Nazi ideology, had to overcome very difficult moments and narrowly escaped internment in a concentration camp.

He died a few years later and was buried at the Foce cemetery.

(Source: Andrea Gandolfo)