State papers: Two-year dispute over swimming pool at Vatican ambassador's residence

The residence of the Irish ambassador to the Holy See at the Villa Spada in Rome. The pool project was plagued by setbacks, including corroded pipes linked to decorative fountains featuring bronze snakes on seashells. File picture

Diplomats in Ireland’s embassy to the Holy See became involved in a protracted two-year dispute over work on a swimming pool in the ambassador’s residence in Rome during the mid-1990s.

State records released for the first time by the National Archives show the swimming pool at Villa Spada, the ambassador’s grand 17th-century residence on Gianicolo Hill overlooking the Italian capital, became the source of heated correspondence between embassy officials and an Italian firm of architects.