* Venues

The former Convitto Palmieri is a majestic neoclassical building in the heart of Lecce, in Piazzetta Carducci, a renowned meeting place for young people.
The building was originally – in the 14th century – composed of the church of S. Francesco della Scarpa and the adjoining convent. In 1800, the latter was used as a barracks, depot, and cavalry hospital, before becoming, in 1816, the site of the “Collegio-Convitto di S. Giuseppe”, the only high school in the Province of Terra d’Otranto. Since then, it has always been a prestigious educational facility (since 1860 it has been named after Giuseppe Palmieri), the fulcrum of education for generations of young people in Lecce. 

Today’s configuration is the result of demolitions, reconstructions and additions carried out during the 19th century.
It is currently one of the city’s most important cultural venues, managed by the Lecce Biblio-museum Pole. 

Classiche Forme 2025 will stop here for two Conversazioni on 14th and 16th July ,in one of its internal cloisters, the most precious. 

Santa Maria di Leuca is a town in the municipality of Castrignano del Capo, famous for being the southernmost point of Puglia and, according to popular legend, the meeting point of two seas, the Ionian and the Adriatic.

Here, on the top of Punta Meliso, a protected area belonging to the Costa Otranto – Santa Maria di Leuca and Bosco di Tricase Park, stand the Basilica of Santa Maria de Finibus terrae and the majestic lighthouse of Leuca, among the highest in Europe.

The first church was built here at the dawn of Christianity, on a pagan temple dedicated to the goddess Minerva. Over the centuries, the sanctuary suffered repeated destruction and looting by the Turks and Saracens and in the 18th century the current basilica was built, which still today preserves many traces of the past within its walls.

The lighthouse of Leuca, built in 1864 based on a design by engineer Achille Rossi, stands where there once was a watchtower, not far from the large square in front of the sanctuary of Santa Maria. 47 metres high, it rises over one hundred metres above the sea waters.

The Convent of the Carmelites of Lecce, currently home to the Rectorate of the University of Salento, together with the adjacent Church of S. Maria del Carmine represents one of the most significant testimonies to the countless historical events that have affected the urban social structure of the city of Lecce.

The Convent is built between the 1500s and 1600s by Paduano Bax, on earlier stratifications. In particular, the cloister, in the second half of the 17th century, was enriched with frescoes depicting stories of the order’s saints, which restoration in the early 2000s has made fragmentarily re-emerge, as well as revealing, thanks to an intensive excavation campaign, a sequence of thirteen phases of occupation ranging from the Paleolithic to the late 1500s, passing through the Messapi, the late Roman age and the Middle Ages.

The Le Costantine Foundation covers more than 33 hectares in the countryside of Uggiano la Chiesa, a stone’s throw from the center of Casamassella, close to the Idro Valley. The blue sea of Otranto frames an enchanting backdrop of woods and Mediterranean scrub.

Before the eyes parade olive groves, meadows, fragrant broom and myrtle bushes, locust trees, holm oaks, pines and many botanical rarities, such as the Vallonea oak and small wild orchids.

Among the various riches guarded by Le Costantine is first and foremost the art of embroidery and weaving. First a tool to promote women’s autonomy and emancipation, today great excellence, recognized in Italy and around the world.

The craftswomen who work there produce textile artifacts of the highest quality by weaving natural fibers with ancient wooden looms with four healds. They use techniques dating back hundreds of years and perform every finish strictly by hand.

Masseria Le Stanzie in Supersano is one of the oldest ‘masseria’ in Salento, now known for the characteristic “te pendula” tomatoes (hanging tomatoes)  that dye many of its porticos red.

Its ideal location in the heart of Salento has made it, over the centuries, an ideal place for pilgrims and wayfarers to stop and rest (the name itself evokes its role as an ancient stazio). 

Today it is much more than an agritourism, it is a true place of worship of the rural civilization and its ancient traditions. It has orchards, olive groves, vineyards, vegetable garden with seasonal vegetable production, and cattle and sheep farms. 

The structure is divided between large and small rooms, courtyards, pergolas, farmyards, granaries, stone ovens and wonderful underground oil mills.

Palazzo Tamborino Cezzi is an aristocratic residence in the historic centre of Lecce. It has struck, among others, director Ferzan Ozpetek who decided to set the film ‘Mine vaganti’ here in 2009.

The structure dates back to the 16th century, of which it still preserves part of the distinctly Renaissance rooms on the ground floor. Since the second half of the 19th century, it has belonged to the Tamborino family, to whom we owe the structural and artistic interventions that give it its current appearance; the Cezzi family, the current owners, are descendants in the maternal line. The 19th-century reworking of the house expresses neoclassical taste combined with elegant eclecticism, as well as Moorish and Oriental memories. The cloister that hosts the concert somehow sums up its entire history.

Belloluogo Park is an equipped green area not far from the center of Lecce. It takes its name from the precious 14th-century Belloluogo Tower located in the northern part of the park, in front of which the ancient moat is still visible: with its circular body, the tower represents one of the rare surviving testimonies of the Salento Middle Ages. It was the historic residence of Queen Marie D’Enghien, who spent the last moments of her life here. 

It is precisely in the area around the famous Belloluogo Park Tower that in July 2022, by concession of the Municipality of Lecce, which owns it, the Oasi Classiche Forme was born, a place where it was imagined that the culture of the Festival could grow. 

Artistic director Beatrice Rana and the Opera Prima association, which organizes the Festival, have pledged to donate and plant a handful of trees each year for the benefit of the Classiche Forme Oasis, the care of which they will look after over time.