Thursday Doors – November 1, 2018

Thursday Doors is a weekly feature allowing door lovers to come together to admire and share their favorite door photos from around the world. Feel free to join in on the fun by creating your own Thursday Doors post each week and then sharing it, between Thursday morning and Saturday noon (North American eastern time), by using the blue link-up button below. 

Teatro di San Carlo and surroundings – Naples, Italy

Picking up where we left off at Castel Nuovo in Naples last week, a few blocks from the castle you will come across another historical treasure; the Teatro di San Carlo.

Look up – there’s beauty everywhere you turn your head!

The building is wedged into a public square, the Piazza Plebiscito at an odd angle, so I just couldn’t get a good shot showing much of the exterior.

Part of the side facade with a trio of old doors

Commissioned by Bourbon King Charles (Carlo) III of Naples, in its current seating configuration the theater can accommodate close to 1400 patrons.

First opening in 1737 it is the oldest continuously running opera house in Europe and is still considered one of grandest ones in the world.

Notice the crown above the royal box.

The foyer and waiting areas are just as lovely as the theater.

Polished marble floors, antique furniture, and statues of old dead opera guys everywhere!

Verdi…I believe.

And a few simple, but elegant looking doors.

During our tour we learned how the king had a secret tunnel built to connect the theater directly to the nearby royal palace so that he would not have to mingle with his subjects.

Just imagine, when attending a performance he would be able to go straight to his royal box without having to come in contact with any riff-raff 😀

The Royal Box

Our guide explained that on the very first opening night, the King discovered one of the drawbacks of slinking in and out without fanfare.

It seems the people in the theater were not even aware when he arrived in his box to take his seat, and they went about their business, chatting and whatnot. The king was aghast that none of his subjects showed him proper respect by rising until he took his seat!

Since the idea of throwing 1400 people into a dungeon didn’t seem too practical, the king did come up with a solution to prevent this kind of slight from happening again.

Any guesses?

Mirrors were added to each of the other boxes, angled precisely to give patrons a perfect view of the royal box. Now no one could use the excuse that they didn’t see the royals arrive.

Side door to the Teatro

 

After our tour I was feeling a little door deprived, so we took a walk around the square; here are a few of the nice doors we found:

See the door within the door?

As always, thank you for visiting 🙂

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