Cuglieri, Park of the former Pontifical Seminary

Park of the former Pontifical Seminary. Photo by Angela Nieddu, 2025, from Catalogo BBCC

The Sardinian Regional Pontifical Seminary was built between 1925 and 1927 on an area specifically identified for its healthy, panoramic and strategic position with respect to the town of Cuglieri. The location choice met specific functional and symbolic needs: isolation, quiet, contact with nature and visual domination of the territory. The park and the surrounding green areas were conceived as an integral part of the complex, both for recreational and formative purposes of the seminary community, and for devotional and contemplative practice. During the twentieth century, open space underwent progressive transformations and phases of partial abandonment, up to the safety and arrangement interventions carried out in 2016, which involved paths, parapets, walls and the area of the statue of the Redeemer. The green area develops mainly on the hilly slopes adjacent to the building, configuring itself as a system of articulated open spaces, in a close visual, functional and symbolic relationship with the main architectural artefact. The area has an irregular planimetric shape, adapted to the morphology of the terrain. The green area is accessed from a side access to the architectural complex. The park can be defined as the only green space with a wooded area characterized by terraces, in which steps are inserted, and open spaces for rest. The system of paths represents the main framework of the open space: they connect the building to the upper areas of the park and to the hilly top, where the statue of the Redeemer is located. These paths also assume a symbolic and devotional value, historically connected to the presence of the Way of the Cross, whose stops are identified by brick newsstands. Inside the park there are individual statues and two areas once used as playgrounds. The vegetation of the park is mainly configured as a natural forest formation, composed of native species typical of the sub-Mediterranean context of Montiferru. The arboreal and shrub heritage contributes decisively to the definition of the landscape character of open space, more similar to a natural hilly park than to a formal ornamental garden.

Aspects of interest
The vegetation structure, consisting of tall trees and continuous undergrowth, reinforces the sense of landscape continuity and helps to integrate the architectural complex into the surrounding environmental context. The whole of the open space therefore assumes the character of a hilly park with a predominant natural imprint, in which anthropogenic elements are inserted in a subordinate way to morphology and vegetation cover.