The Getty Villa Free Admission Saturday

Free Admission Saturday at The Getty Villa - see INFO below. The Getty Villa is modeled after the Villa dei Papiri in Herculaneum, Italy. The building was constructed in the early 1970s by architects who worked closely with founder J. Paul Getty. The Villa dei Papiri (Villa of the Papyruses) was rediscovered in the 1750s. The excavation recovered bronze and marble sculptures, wall paintings, colorful stone pavements, and over a thousand papyrus scrollshence the name. Buried by the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in A.D. 79, much of the Villa dei Papiri remains unexcavated. Therefore, architects based many of the Museum's architectural and landscaping details on elements from other ancient Roman houses in the towns of Pompeii, Herculaneum, and Stabiae. The scale, appearance, and some of the materials of the Getty Villa are taken from the Villa dei Papirisuch as the floor planthough it is a mirror of the original. More Info below.