Italy: A touch of lakeside class

The locals had plenty to chew on during last September’s Stresa music festival. Never mind the three-hour Cossi Fan Tutti opera conducted by one of the world’s most sought-after conductors, or the 22-year-old solo violinist flown in from New York; the society wedding of the year, between Lavinia Borromeo and John Elkann, Gianni Agnelli’s grandson and heir to the Fiat dynasty, was about to take place.

The name Borromeo carries significant clout on the Italian Riviera. A noble Milanese dynasty who made the lake their holiday home in the 18th and 19th centuries, most visitors get a glimpse of their lavish lifestyle on Isola Bella, one of three small islands floating in Lake Maggiore.

Here, the ancestral Borromeos built gardens and a palace stuffed with Venetian chandeliers, marble, priceless artworks, tapestries, paintings, antique furniture and stuccoes. The garden, featuring 10 terraces sloping down to the lake, made a spectacular setting for the wedding party.

The wedding meant closing roads and the mountain funicular as well as a whole island, along with its shops and restaurants, to tourists. A swarm of Prada-clad officials and security had descended like black locusts in preparation for the arrival of 700 socialites and guests including Henry Kissinger, the Rothschilds, the Italian prime minister and the president of Fiat – also the man behind the Ferrari racing team.

The bride wore Valentino, and my taxi driver was due to collect the designer from the airport the following day. Our guide, well up on local gossip, said rumour had it Gianni Agnelli’s mother Margherita had hinted she may not attend the wedding because of a rift over the Agnelli inheritance. Later, in the deli La Cambusa, at a tasting of the region’s local cheeses, wines, salamis and finest olive oils, the excitable proprietress told us it was a disgrace that restaurateurs, forced to close their businesses, would not be compensated for loss of earnings.

And so it went on.

Stresa is a genteel town unused to the focus of the Italian media. With its grand lake-front hotels, manicured lawns, botanical gardens and slow pace, it is faintly reminiscent of Eastbourne – with a glorious mountain backdrop, infinitely superior cuisine and an island-studded blue lake in place of the grey English Channel. Queen Victoria, who appears in a drawing at Villa Clara ‘taking the air’ in Baveno in 1879, is one of its most famous guests.

For all their grandeur, the Italian lake resorts are in no way flashy. With its baroque castles and Renaissance villas the destination reeks of old money, but compared with the brash French Riviera where new money flaunts itself in yachts and glamour, wealth here is restrained. Of the five lakes – Como, Iseo, Lugano, Maggiore and Garda – Como and Garda are perhaps the best known among UK visitors. But explore a bit further and you’ll find other bucolic lakeside towns that have kept their beauty all to themselves. Stresa and the tiny Orta on Lake Orta are the unsung heroes of the lakes – many visitors in fact arrive here by default on day trips from the better-known lake resorts.

Keen to attract a younger market, the tourism authorities are keen to highlight the potential for mountain biking, trekking and lake sports – swimming, beach activities, sailing, canoeing, surfing and waterskiing. But it’s impossible to ignore the magnificent gardens, island villas, cobbled village streets and Belle Epoque palaces that give the Italian Lakes their identity.

The trio of Borromeo islands, Madre, Bella and Pescatori (the fisherman’s Isle), are not to be missed. One of the highlights of our visit was an evening concert at Isola Madre, as part of the annual Stresa Musical Festival.

After arriving by ferry boat we followed the candle-lit stone steps and wafts of citronella up through sumptuous gardens and past the island’s tiny church to a peach-coloured palazzo where a violin soloist was about to perform. A more magical setting, surrounded by hibiscus and camellia blossoms – all illuminated by candlelight and a full moon, is hard to imagine.

The next day we toured the lavish Borromeo Palace and extravagant terraced gardens of Isola Bella complete with its grottoes, fountains and statues and for lunch ate fresh perch on the terrace of a lakeside restaurant.

Returning home our guide reported that roads duly closed but a small crowd was allowed to watch the 700 wedding guests board a private steamer to Isola Bella. Back on Fiat territory, in Turin, a second reception was held at Mole Antonelliano, whose 85-metre cuppola will be used in the logo for the 2006 Winter Olympics.