Conegliano is a multifaceted reality where over the years wine production has taken on an important role. In fact, the town is not only one of the two capitals of the hilly area of Prosecco Superiore, today a UNESCO World Heritage Site, but also a reference point for the wine-growing area of the Piave plain; the area of choice for red wines. The Castle overlooking Conegliano, the medieval heart of the town and today home to the civic museum, is the perfect meeting point for two different roads; the “white wine” route and the “red wine” route.
Conegliano’s prestigious Oenological School opened in 1877. It was the first in Italy, and the pride of the scientific community and beyond. But the town is also imbued with refined art. Between the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, urban renewal beautifully marked the face of Conegliano, mainly with the construction of the two continuous and long series of porticos of large and small mansions and houses, lining each side of the current “Via XX Settembre”. The facades are all finely marked by frescoes or decorations in terracotta and stone. Along these porticoes stands the “Scuola dei Battuti”, an admirable work of architectural art of the fifteenth century entirely decorated with frescoes of ethereal beauty, from whose own large portico you can also access the Cathedral of the same period. The Cathedral houses the works of one of the most important Veneto exponents of the Renaissance pictorial art, Giovanni Battista Cima. In the apse of the Cathedral you can admire his altarpiece with the Madonna; a work of refined elegance and sensitivity. In the street that runs behind the Church stands the birthplace of the artist in which is situated a Foundation devoted to the study of his works. Not far away is the Palazzo Sarcinelli, a magnificent Renaissance building which today houses the gallery of modern and contemporary art and is the location for many cultural events in Conegliano.