Monastero di San Giovanni Evangelista

Adjoining the church is the monastery of San Giovanni which also dates to the 10th century. While most of what we could see was unadorned and peaceful, the library was an explosion of colour and decoration, filled with frescos painted by two artists from Bologna, Giovanni Antonio Paganino and Ercole Pio. It took just one year for the artists to fresco the 21 metre long, 13 metre wide and 6 metre high hall. It is so impressive and the detail and subjects are so interesting. It has a different feel again to the other amazing places we have visited today.

The library has manuscripts dating back to the 15th century and over 40000 books that can indeed be loaned out.

This sort of stuff just blows my mind. It’s hard to believe we can walk in buildings and observe art and architecture that is around 1000 years old. Just amazing. I had added Parma to our holiday itinerary for its food history and had no clue that these amazing buildings would be the highlight of our trip for me.Read more