The Italian Embassy has two magnificent premises, built in the 19th century in two of Tehran’s oldest gardens, both owned, through various vicissitudes, by the aristocratic Farmanfarma family related to the Qajar dynasty.
The nucleus of the first garden, where the Embassy on Neauphle Le Chateau Street stands today, began to take shape in the second half of the 19th century, during the years that saw a major urban expansion of Tehran.
At the time, it was located in a small section of uncultivated land outside the city, known as Nosrat-abad, named after its first owner, Prince Firuz Mirza Nosrat al-Doulé, the head of the Farmanfarma family. After Nosrat al-Doulé, the next owner and founder of the garden proper was probably Haji Abdallah Qaragözlu, who enjoyed the title of Haji Amir Nezam and who, during the reign of Mozaffar al-Din Shah (1896-1907) held numerous high government posts. Haji Amir Nezam died in 1915, bequeathing three gardens to his sons. Hosein Qoli Qaragözlu inherited his father Amir Nezam’s title and also the garden that later became the seat of the Italian Embassy. At the time of his father Haji Amir Nezam, there were several buildings in the garden, including the biruni, where the men of the house received their guests, and the andaruni, a building reserved for women.
In the centre of the garden was a huge pool measuring 58 metres by 64 metres that served as a water reservoir. In the centre of this basin was a small island with four willows. To the north, the islet was joined to the shore by a graceful little bridge. Later, due to maintenance difficulties, this pool was replaced by a lawn of equal size. The garden with its huge pool and biruni were sold by Hosein Qoli Khan Qaragözlu Amir Nezam to the Italian Embassy on 6 June 1925, during the mission led by Carlo Galli.
The current building is the result of the architectural intervention carried out on the previous structure in that same year by the Russian architect Markov, with a strong ‘Palladian’ imprint. The interior of the building has many features typical of Persian architecture, but the architectural design as a whole is clearly in the Farangi (European) style, which was very popular at the time. The self-supporting Ionic columns with their scrolled capitals, the plaster mouldings of the ceiling, the Palladian-style modillions and double-leaf doors, the stucco decorations around the mirrors, the ornate corbels and fireplaces and the upper decoration of the doors, all follow the Farangi fashion as it had become established in Iran at the end of Mozaffar al-Din Shah’s reign.