Rome's Galleria Borghese has opened an architectural competition for a 3,000-square-metre extension costing $11.15 million, backed by Italy's Ministry of Cultural Heritage and the city of Rome. The 17th-century villa museum now draws around 700,000 visitors a year, 60 percent of them from abroad, and caps daily entry at 2,000 people who have booked online. Its director, Francesca Cappelletti, says disappointed visitors are turned away from the park every day because no places are left.

The new wing would let the museum show works that currently sit in storage, stage more exhibitions, and add a restaurant or bookshop and a laboratory. Cappelletti has insisted the addition must be a contemporary structure that blends with the villa's white style and surrounding park, arguing that the Louvre pyramid proves a modern intervention can work. The competition is organised by the engineering firm Proger Spa, which is also a patron of the museum. Firms have until 13 November to express interest, and an independent jury is expected to choose a winner in mid-May 2027, with the museum keeping the final decision.

Heritage campaigners have reacted with fury. Alix van Buren, president of the Friends of the Villa Borghese association, called the proposal grotesque and blasphemous, describing the villa as one of the most perfect and unalterable artistic ecosystems human genius has ever created. Michele Campisi, general secretary of Italia Nostra, called the plans bizarre and accused the museum of trying to compete with the Colosseum for popularity. Art historian Tomaso Montanari called the extension moronic, comparing it to building an addition on Brunelleschi's dome in Florence.

The row has also turned political. Fabio Rampelli, vice-president of Italy's lower house of parliament and a close ally of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, used a Facebook post to call for Cappelletti's resignation, accusing her of treating the villa as if it were her own back garden. Cappelletti has held her ground, arguing that a museum whose visitor numbers have outgrown its historic rooms has no choice but to grow.