Born from a Villa

It was located in Via Roccasterone, just above the old (and then demolished) Hotel Bellevue. It was the former villa of the Barons Blanchi of Bezancourt, built in neo-Gothic style by the architect Poulan of Nice.

Very elegant inside (full of two panels by the Parmesan painter Ferrarini), it had a "rotunda" that rose like a tower up to the top floor and was a panoramic viewpoint over most of Sanremo and the sea.

It was called, in the Thirties, Albergo Pensione Imperiale, a name with which it operated until the Sixties.

The old Imperial, however, is no longer there.

In its place, at the end of the seventies, was built a later, modern, Hotel Residence Imperiale, which has defended the tradition of the name although with completely different characteristics from the old hotel.

Today it is only a Residence.

The last descendant of the family, owner of the property, who was later struck by financial instability, Count Romano Blanchi di Bezancourt had a life of hardship in the shadow of his title and became a typical character of Sanremo.

He died in 1940, at the Civil Hospital, in the most absolute poverty.

(source: "Una Stagione lunga cent'anni", by Bruno Monticone)