This years contest for Italys Most Beautiful Garden lists ten finalists calculated to give judges a hard time choosing a winner. The contestants range from Ventimiglia on the French border of Italy to Sicily in the south and all have outstanding features and character.

The top ten are as follows: the Hanbury Botanical Gardens, Ventimiglia, and Villa Durazzo Pallavicini, Genoa, both in Ligury, the Vittoriale Degli Italiani, the poet Gabriele D'Annunzios  retreat at Gardone Riviera, Lake Garda, the Villa Medicea di Castello and the Villa Gamberaia, Settignano, Florence, Villa Lante, Viterbo and The Garden of Ninfa, Latina in Lazio, writer Axel Munthes Villa San Michele, Capri and the Kolymbetra Garden in the Valley of the Temples, Agrigento, Sicily.

The competition, which has now reached its ninth edition and proves ever more popular, is organized by architect Leandro Mastria, with the support of the Ministry of Heritage and Culture, the Italian Foundation for the Environment  (FAI) and the Italian Association of Landscape Architecture (AIAPP).

The winner will be announced after the summer.