This green park is called Parco della Favorita, but more than a park it looks like a forest. You won't come across it if you walk through the city center, because Palermo's green lung is on the way to Mondello beach.
Larger than New York's Central Park, it was created by King Ferdinand IV of Bourbon as a hunting ground in 1799, an activity of which he was very fond. So, in this park where today you can run, walk or hide from the heat with a picnic, in the Eighteenth century used to be full of pheasants and rabbits and hunts were organized for the King’s pleasure.
In the park, in addition to hunting, the king had an extravagant residence built to live in with his wife, Maria Carolina of Austria, when they fled Naples in 1798.
This is the Palazzina Cinese, a villa in oriental style, with its five floors, pagoda roof and portico supported by six marble columns, is striking both for its beauty and its eccentricity.
This original Royal refuge can be visited, and its interior is as unusual as the external part, with its walls decorated with silk panels with Chinese motifs or trompe l'oeil frescoes. You can also discover the most intimate rooms, such as the bedrooms and even the king's bathroom, with a large marble bathtub. And of course, the curious dining room with its mathematical table, which allowed dishes to be brought up from the kitchens on the lower floor.
Although many think that the name of the park, La Favorita, is because it was the "favorite" place of the king, in reality it seems that its origin is due to another kind of favorite “things”: women.
t is believed that the “favorite” was the Duchess of Floridia and Partanna, Lucia Migliaccio, a Sicilian noblewoman who was also married. Even if it was love at first sight, obviously the relationship remained clandestine, but finally ended in marriage when both widowed.