Palazzo Cernezzi

On the square Como dedicates to its most famous son stands the palace that still runs the city. Palazzo Cernezzi, rebuilt over medieval fabric in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, its renewal attributed to Giovanni Antonio Piotti known as il Vacallo, has been Como's municipal seat since 1853, a town hall whose Renaissance facades frame Piazza Volta.

Why it matters

Como's civic story is usually told through the medieval Broletto beside the cathedral, but Palazzo Cernezzi carries the later chapter: the Renaissance refashioning of a patrician house into the seat of city government. Its layered fabric combines medieval construction with a Renaissance and early modern renewal attributed to architect Giovanni Antonio Piotti, called il Vacallo, illustrating how Como reused its past.

What to notice

The orderly façade and its scale reveal a private palace converted to public use rather than a purpose-built town hall. The structure incorporates medieval construction beneath its Renaissance exterior. The Cemme family owned it until 1591, when it passed to architect Piotti il Vacallo, likely responsible for the renewal; the Porta Cernezzi family owned it from 1657, followed by the Brocca and Bruni families in the nineteenth century, before the city purchased it in 1853.

Context and history

The palace rose between the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries over earlier medieval structures. The Cemme family owned it until 1591, when they sold it to Giovanni Antonio Piotti, called il Vacallo, an architect of the Como and Ticino building world, who was probably the author of the renovation that gave the palace its Renaissance character. Successive owners followed, the Porta Cernezzi family in 1657, Giovanni Brocca in 1821, Agostino Bruni in 1838, until in 1853 the City of Como bought the building and converted it to municipal offices, the function it has kept ever since. The palace stands among Como's historic civic buildings, alongside the Broletto and the medieval towers.