Caltagirone (Sicily)

Caltagirone is a town and comune in the Metropolitan City of Catania, Sicily, southern Italy. The town is a production center of pottery, particularly maiolica and terra-cotta wares. The city was almost completely destroyed by the earthquake of 1693. Many public and private buildings have then been reconstructed in Baroque style. Primarily for this reason the city has been included, together with the surrounding territory, in an area protected by the UNESCO World Heritage program. The main landmark of the city is the 142-step monumental Scalinata di Santa Maria del Monte (Staircase of Santa Maria del Monte), built from 1608 in the old part of the town. The peculiarity is that each step is decorated with different hand-decorated ceramics, using styles and figures derived from the millennial tradition of pottery making. Once a year, on and around the day of the city's patron saint, (St. James, 25 July), the staircase is illuminated with candles of different colours arranged in order to reconstruct an artistic drawing of several tens of meters.