was a themed commercial complex operated within the Nagoya Port Garden area within

Nagoya Port The , located in Ise Bay, is the largest and busiest trading port in Japan, accounting for about 10% of the total trade value of Japan. Notably, this port is the largest exporter of cars in Japan and where the Toyota Motor Corporation exports most ...

in Minato-ku, Nagoya,

Aichi Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Chūbu region of Honshū. Aichi Prefecture has a population of 7,552,873 () and a geographic area of with a population density of . Aichi Prefecture borders Mie Prefecture to the west, Gifu Prefecture ...

, Japan. It consisted of theme park attractions such gondola and horse-drawn carriage rides as well as Italian-themed stores and restaurants. Italia Mura opened in April 2005, about a month before Nagoya established a sister city relationship with

Turin Turin ( , Piedmontese: ; it, Torino ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in Northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital from 1861 to 1865. Th ...

. Due to increasing debt, the facility closed in May 2008. The site was used by various businesses and as a cosplay backdrop through December 2014, when it was closed for demolition. Final demolition concluded in June 2015.

History

Italia Mura opened on 2 April 2005 as a "convenient way for apanesepeople to get a taste of something different". The park featured imported Italian gondolas operated by Italians on a replica of a Venice canal, a replica of

St Mark's Campanile St Mark's Campanile ( it, Campanile di San Marco, ) is the bell tower of St Mark's Basilica in Venice, Italy. The current campanile is a reconstruction completed in 1912, the previous tower having collapsed in 1902. At in height, it is the talle ...

at the entrance to the park, a replica of

Michelangelo Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (; 6 March 1475 – 18 February 1564), known as Michelangelo (), was an Italian sculptor, painter, architect, and poet of the High Renaissance. Born in the Republic of Florence, his work was ins ...

's famous ''David'' statue, a replica of the Bocca della Verità, as well as 80 Italian themed restaurants and stores. The facility was about in size. The park was developed by the Nagoya Port Authority and , and was operated by . During its first year in operation, it had 4.35 million visitors, more than twice the projected visitors. That same year, Nagoya established a sister city relationship with

. In February 2008, Cest la vie failed to make a ¥100 million payment on a hot springs facility for Italia Mura, followed by the discovery of ¥100 million in unpaid taxes owed to the city of Nagoya. Additionally, the number of visitors had dwindled to less than half of those in the first year. The park filed for bankruptcy and closed in May that year, and Cest la vie Holdings and two other subsidiaries filed for reorganization bankruptcy at the same time. The court filings for the bankruptcy protection indicated Italia Mura had about ¥17 billion in debt obligations, with the parent company and the other two subsidiaries having an additional ¥13 billion in debt. About 360 employees at Italia Mura were let go when it closed.

After closure

The day following the closure, the attorney appointed to oversee the bankruptcy assets announced that items from Italian Mura would be sold to the public at 50-90 percent off the retail price in order to get rid of inventory quickly and recover as much funding as possible to pay toward the outstanding debts. The

expatriate An expatriate (often shortened to expat) is a person who resides outside their native country. In common usage, the term often refers to educated professionals, skilled workers, or artists taking positions outside their home country, either ...

Italians working at the facility had been hired on a 15-year contract and held a press conference expressing their frustration and anger over being fired when the park closed. At the time Italia Mura was closed, there were 18 Italians working at the park and living with their families in company housing. They stated they would be evicted at the end of May. After the closure and bankruptcy filings, it was discovered that construction documents had been falsified, showing

steel frame Steel frame is a building technique with a "skeleton frame" of vertical steel columns and horizontal I-beams, constructed in a rectangular grid to support the floors, roof and walls of a building which are all attached to the frame. The develop ...

construction being used for the buildings when 14 of them were instead built with traditional wood framing. Various plans were made to use the facilities for other projects, but none of the plans were finalized and many of the buildings were demolished over the following years. Nagoya Port Authority announced the remaining buildings would be demolished in June 2015. Beginning in May 2014, the former site of Italia Mura became known as a place for cosplayers to take photos because of the Italian architecture of the facilities. At least five cosplay photo events were held or planned at the site that year. The final event was planned for December 24, the day before the site was closed for demolition. Following the demolition, commercial developments were planned for the area to begin in March 2015. A request for redevelopment proposals was issued by the Nagoya Port Management Association in October 2014. The former site of Italia Mura was used for

PCR test The polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is a method widely used to rapidly make millions to billions of copies (complete or partial) of a specific DNA sample, allowing scientists to take a very small sample of DNA and amplify it (or a part of it) ...

ing for

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease quick ...

in August 2020.

References

External links

*{{commons category inline, Nagoya Port Italian Village Buildings and structures in Nagoya Defunct shopping malls Shopping malls disestablished in 2008 2008 disestablishments in Japan