August 1797. After spending the night on Isola Bella, before returning to the shores of Verbano, Napoleon Bonaparte requested to be taken to Isola Madre. He noticed numerous pheasants amongst the luxuriant vegetation, (still today they roam freely between the hibiscus, rhododendrons and cedars) and his hunting instinct was piqued.

So much so that, when he set sail from the island, he carried his hunting trophy with him. On the other hand, as another famous Frenchman, Gustave Flaubert, wrote about half a century later, if Isola Madre is the “most voluptuous place” in the world, it is perhaps because when one visits the beautiful isle it is difficult to resist one's desires.

If today it stands like an enchanting green jewel in the middle of the lake, it is thanks to the Borromeo family who, starting from the sixteenth century, transformed the island by constructing a splendid palazzo - designed by the architect Pellegrino Pellegrini, known as il Tibaldi - and an English garden, one of the oldest in Italy, an arcadian showcase with an abundance of exotic plants. In the eighteenth century the palazzo was redesigned by the architect Filippo Cagnola who created the elaborate stairways and pergolas. Then, in the nineteenth century, the island was transformed into a romantic garden, in pursuit of the sublime in Nature. 

Thus, the island once known as San Vittore, which in the Middle Ages belonged to abbots and bishops whose olive trees produced oil for religious ceremonies, became the Isola Renata in 1563, in honour of the new owner: Renato Borromeo. 

In 1978, Borromeo’s descendants opened the palazzo and garden to visitors, and nowadays Isola Madre is widely acknowledged as the largest and most luxuriant of all the Borromean islands.