What's the Limonaia - Lemon houses - THE CULTIVATION OF LEMON

• The architectural structure
• Società Lago di Garda
• THE CULTIVATION OF LEMON
• THE BEGINNIN OF THE DECLINE

Lemon fruit has its natural habitat in a belt between the 40^th parallel north and the 40^th parallel south. The Riviera of Lake Garda has represented for centuries the most northern cultivation in the world, almost 46° latitude, and for this reason an object for interest and research.

The technique used to build these gardens can duly be considered a handbook of Bioclimatic Architecture. In fact the builders of the lemon gardens (called “limonaia”, or “limoneto”, or “limoniera”, or “garden” or “serra” or, in the local dialect “sardì” or “limunèra”) were careful in choosing the right place, following the indication suggested by experience and usage: the distance from the lake, a natural source of heat; the barrier of high cypresses used as a shelter from cold blowing winds; the abundance of water streams and creeks; high, rocky mountains behind, good as a protection an heat storage.

The structure around Garda represented a unique horticultural solution.

A part of the book "The Lemon Gardens of Lake Garda from the past to the present" of Leila Losi