How Was Asiago Built

Almost nothing in Asiago predates 1918. The town was rebuilt through the 1920s to a coherent scheme, giving it something unusual in Italy: a historic centre that is entirely of one period, in a restrained stone-and-stucco manner around a large central square and an arcaded main street.

The Duomo di San Matteo was rebuilt in the same campaign, on the site of the destroyed church, and the Torre Civica beside the town hall is likewise a reconstruction.

The Sacrario Militare del Leiten, completed in 1938, is the plateau's monumental architecture: a great square mausoleum on the hill above the town, with a colonnaded arcade and a central cross, designed to be visible from everywhere on the plateau. It holds the remains of around 54,000 soldiers, roughly half of them unidentified, from both armies.

Out on the plateau the vernacular survives: malghe -- long, low stone dairy buildings with byre and cheese room under one roof -- and the contrade, the scattered stone hamlets of the Cimbrian settlement.

At Cima Ekar stands the observatory dome housing the 182-centimetre Copernico telescope, the largest optical telescope in Italy.