The late 19th century was the age of glass-roofed galleries in many European cities, but for Naples, the Galleria Umberto I played a special role. Italy had just been unified, and a building boom was underway; for Naples it was called a ‘resanamento,’ a move to make the city healthy again after long neglect.
It also meant, for political reasons, that the poorer south had to see some signs that it was being treated equally with the wealthier north, which may be why the architect, Emanuele Rocco, borrowed so much from the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele I in Milan.
Both galleries got royal names; Vittorio Emanuele was the first king of united Italy, and Umberto had succeeded him by the time the gallery was opened in 1891.
It’s had a checkered history. After World War I its patrician appeal slipped, and parts were neglected. Its re-opening after World War II was part of the rebuilding of the city after wartime damage, but by the 1970s and 1980s, it fell into decay again, and was nearly demolished.
As you can see in the pictures, it’s still getting a lot of work, but it, and the area around it, are clearly on the upswing again.
The Galleria was built with a social as well as a purely commercial purpose: It aimed to combine shops with open public spaces, almost an indoor piazza, and private spaces, in the form of apartments on the upper floors of the buildings that are the base of the glass galleries and roof. Below, a postcard view from around 1910.
Each of the four facades at the central crossing shares size and form with the others, but each has its own decorative features. The floor mosaics represent a variety of legendary and historic figures.
