Torre Guinigi

The Torre Guinigi is a brick tower in the walled Tuscan city of Lucca, built by a wealthy merchant family in the fourteenth century and rising about 45 metres. Its most famous feature is the small grove of holm oak trees growing in a hanging garden at its summit, a rare survival of a medieval fashion for rooftop greenery. Visitors climb a stone and wooden staircase to reach the tree-shaded terrace, which gives a distinctive view over the compact old town and its Renaissance ramparts.