Nestling in a hilly landscape between Asti and Alba, this castle originally dates back to the Middle Ages, when it was owned by the Solaro family, important nobles in the Asti area. The Alfieri family took over the property in 1616. Between 1696 and 1721, it underwent major refurbishment to become an elegant baroque residence. In the 18th century, the park was re-arranged into a formal French-inspired design. It was broadly revised when Kurten redesigned it as a landscaped park in 1815, on what in all likelihood was the German architect’s first job in Piedmont; he had come to Turin during the Napoleonic period, when Marquis Carlo Emanuele Alfieri di Sostegno was Savoy Ambassador. Centuries-old specimens of exotic species, including a rare Abies pinsapo, a native of Andalusia, illustrates the garden designer’s typically 19th-century approach to botanical collecting. At the edge of the wood, a surprising example of ars topiaria juxtaposes cubic and rounded shapes to create a structure that seems to echo the beautiful hemicycle-shaped brick greenhouse in front of the residence’s main facade. The opposite side of the building opens onto a hanging garden, a large belvedere overlooking Tanaro valley, characterized by a 20th-century parterrethat forms the shape of a halved daisy, in homage to Marchesa Margherita Pallavicino Mossi, who with her husband Giovanni Maria Visconti Venosta owned the castle between 1937 and 1982.