A hard-working country

Between 1963 and 1964 four popular 45 records were released: Sapore di sale, Una rotonda sul mare, Abbronzatissima and Sul cocuzzolo della montagna. These four songs, sung respectively by Gino Paoli, Fred Buongusto and Edoardo Vianello, can be considered the pop celebration of a new, optimistic rite that characterized the Italian “economic miracle”: summer holidays.

Precisely in those years, the “boom” was coming to an end (again in 1963 a movie by Vittorio Sica was released, starring Alberto Sordi and called The boom). The strong economic growth gave way to a more complex and delicate phase of our country’s political and economic life, called the “conjuncture”.

Holidays had already become a phenomenon that involved an increasingly significant part of the population: in 1959 13% of Italians went on vacation, but in the early sixties the percentage had already risen to 21% to then reach 46% in the mid-eighties. Private motorization policies and the construction of Autostrada del Sole, connecting Milan to Naples(1956-1964), offered formidable incentives.

The itinerary collects a series of works that embody this important phenomenon, soon to become one of the engines of our country’s economic dynamics, highlighting its great potential for tourism. The illustrated works are hotels, residential complexes, holiday houses, tourist villages, lidos and mountain huts and settlements, as well as spas and recreational theme parks. Many Italian regions and different kinds of offerings are represented: sea, mountain, hot springs, hills and lakes.