It is maybe unsurprising that Alvaro Nobile Mino, patriarch of his family and curator of a richly diverse 1940s villetta in Rome’s Appio Latino, was an eager collector from an early age. As a boy, he would save his weekly paghetta and instead of spending it on sweets, games and comic books, he’d knock on the doors of dealers and galleries or wander around the famous Porta Portese street market keeping his eyes peeled for antiques. ‘No-one thought that a ten-year-old child could really be interested in these things,’ says his youngest daughter, Veronica. But the fascination held. Alvaro later studied Medieval history and regarded his vast collection of paintings, sculptures and antiquarian books as part of a mission to preserve history.
Alvaro considered himself a custodian of all things ancient. The many bookshelves in the villetta, which is now occupied by his daughters, are heaving with literature from all eras. In front of them hang numerous portraits of bishops and cardinals, many of whom were canonised. ‘Yes, he had a certain, let’s say infatuation, with saints,’ Veronica explains, ‘though he wasn’t religious.’ What intrigued him most was the lives of the people behind their formal Catholic robes as well as how they were portrayed in scripts and paintings over centuries.
In the 1950s Alvaro met Alba, got married, bought the villetta and the two set up an antique shop together, making a name for themselves in the worlds of art dealers and interior design. They had three daughters – Eleonora, Emanuela and Veronica – all three of whom are passionate about art. Alvaro loved the shop and didn’t distinguish between the business and home – the shop was an extension of the house and he was very attached to everything in it. On multiple occasions he would regret a sale and spend sleepless nights brooding it over, or retract an offer and serve the bad news to a client: the object is no longer for sale.
Alvaro passed on his knowledge and passion to his daughters by taking them to museums, the Roman forum, the basilicas of the capital and abbeys around the province. Anything related to Rome, whether Christian or pagan, was of importance. ‘He made us understand the period in which things were created – and why,’ says Veronica.
Even though the house might look like a gallery, it was never considered as such. ‘Our parents didn’t make us live in a museum,’ says Veronica, recounting how everything in the house was considered everyday objects and family heirlooms, though she recalls childhood friends being afraid to knock things over or feeling watched by the many portraits.
Growing up with a father who seemed to know everything about everything wasn’t always easy: the sense of not knowing it all could at times feel like a burden. Instead of following the rest of the family in studying art history, Veronica ultimately chose a different path. Today she is an interior decorator, with a special interest in colour, designing her own pieces – mainly in classic materials such as bronze, marble and silk – both in her own capacity and in collaboration with the Rome-based jeweller’s Iosselliani.
Six years ago, Alvaro died. As a coping mechanism and to develop a deeper understanding of the collection they had inherited, Veronica started what she thinks of as an inventory. Books were taken off the shelves, dusted and put back in order; paintings and marble statues were catalogued and repositioned, and some donated. From previously unexplored recesses appeared a vast, undocumented collection of San Carlo Borromeo paraphernalia – one of Alvaro’s favourite saints.
The villetta had already been divided into separate units years earlier when Eleonora, the eldest daughter, married and moved out. The sitting room on the ground floor, renamed the salone del nobile, remained the central meeting point and now serves as Veronica’s office. The space, which thus far had been fitted out in bourgeois style, has recently been shaped more to her taste, drawing inspiration from Villa Vizcaya in Miami, Coco Chanel’s apartment at 31 Rue Cambon and Victor Hugo’s Paris maison. The result is a broad-ranging mix of her parents’ antique art, leather sofas from the 1970s, animal-esque table bases, cocoon lamps and rich silk drapes. She considers the latter ‘the dress of a house – a beautiful couture dress – that gives a sense of elegance and character’.
Upstairs in the private living quarters, just above the family salone, Veronica pays homage to André Breton’s famous wall at 42 Rue Fontaine in Paris, covered with some 255 objects. She had seen it as a 14-year-old girl and was fascinated by the collection of personal memories assembled in what might at first seem an illogical order. Now her one-bedroom quarters are slowly being populated with her own treasures – wayang shadow puppets; antique rice holders that are used for holding anything from socks to paint samples; an ever-growing collection of cocoon lamps and bronze animal sculptures; and her own design pieces, combined with portraits and marble busts from the family collection.
The Nobile Mino household has always been, and still is, very dynamic, reflected in the way they’ve always lived: furniture, objects and paintings move freely around the house. The siblings could come home after school and find that one of the bedrooms had swapped places with the dining room while they were way – the new salon already decorated with paintings and fitted with chandeliers. It was this family spirit that encouraged Veronica to take the leap and make changes in the house, although the decision was not taken lightly.
‘We are a very close-knit family and we are missing an important piece [in Alvaro],’ but it was necessary to lighten things up and refine the interiors, make space and bring the collections together, explains Veronica. Her partner, Nilton Cesar, has borne witness to her mission. On numerous occasions, after a long day at work, he finds her in the ‘starting blocks’, moving marble busts from A to B with a few detours on the way. According to Veronica, he helps carry much more than heavy statues – he has been an enduring source of moral support in the cataloguing of her father’s collection.
To this day, there is no such thing as ‘finished’ in the Nobile Mino home, and in this way the house and its ever-changing contents are a continuation of the work Veronica’s parents started.
To see more of Veronica Nobile Mino’s work, visit @veronicanobilemino
