Lucci Hotel Rome Blog

Nero (year 54-68) was famous for  his self indulgence. The legends say he sang watching from a tower how Rome was burning down in flames.
It is not proved he had the fores set himself using the Christians to be accused and in this way putting them for centuries under persecution.
Nero  was  a malicious, cruel and even mad character.
He became an emperor after his mother poisoned his step father  Claudius. In turn Nero murdered his mother.
His self indulgence brought him to the extent that he built a  palace dedicated to himself. So he did and It used to occupy part of the Palatine Hill and most of the Celian and Esquiline Hills.
As a  comparison this area is 25 times bigger than the Colosseum.
The vestibule of the palace itself contained a huge gilded statue of Nero.
There even artificial lake with gardens and wood where wild beasts were let to live free.

The palace had collection of nymphaeums,bath houses ,banquet rooms and all surrounded by vast complex of fountains with water drained from the surrounded hills.
Inside the palace some of the walls and colons were covered with gold and mother-of-pearls.
The ceilings of the rooms were designed in a way that they showered the guests with flowers of perfumes.
The dining hall rotated according to the moving sunlight.
Big garden parties and banquets serviced by aristocratic women have been happening often.
After time Nero was forced into killing himself in year 68.
His successors wishing to distance from the emperor-monster made their best to destroy and erase all the traces of Nero and his ‘Golden House’.
Vespasian was the one who drained the lake and started building the Colosseum on its place.
Hadrian placed the Temple of Venus and Rome over the vestibule.
Recent excavations revealed large frescoes and mosaics.
How to reach the  Domus Aurea from My Hotel Rome :
Take line B of the metro and get off at stop ‘Colosseo’
Go out and start walking left around 200 meters.

Mr Wiltshire is not your average Londoner. Born in 1974 from West Indian parents, affected of a form of autism he never was able to communicate with the outside world like the rest of us. He grew up with his mum and sister. It soon became obvious that he had an exceptional talent at drawing and recreating scenes of what he saw.

As early as 1987, he was spotted by the BBC and the very same year some of his works were already published. Since then Stephen Wiltshire became the subject of many Tv documentaries.

If at the beginning Stephen would draw animals, then London buses, he eventually dedicated to landscapes, cities and great buildings of all over the world: In 2001, further to flying over the city by helicopter, he then did a perfectly detailed and accurate drawing of London. Subsequently , he also drew Tokyo in 2005, and at a later stage he drew Frankfurt and Hong Kong.

Stephen Wiltshire, now known as the Human Eye because of his extraordinary ability to memorize all visual details and to recopy them on paper, came to Rome in June 2005. He took a short trip on helicopter during which he admired the Trevi Fountain, Rome St Peter’s Cathedral, the Ancient Rome and the Colosseum and the Venezia Square, and also flew over our My Hotel Rome.

His drawing of the city of Rome took him a couple of days only, and the accuracy of it all is simply amazing.

Watch here for the full video of the Rome trip and drawing: