|
 On the top of a gentle hill surmounting a small town, erected in the 16th Century on the ruins of an old Fortress, this important Villa was used for accommodation by the Grand Dukes (Medici) during the hunting season.
The building has been developed around the 17th Century by the administrator of an old farm, located near Pisa, belonging to the Medici family.
At the beginning of the 18th Century the noble family passed it into the hands of Giovanni Maria Berti who kept the property for some years until Santi Banti bought it.
With this new owner the property changed its destination from a Casa Padronale, especially used to control the agricultural production, to a noble villa, which has reflected the prestige of the family to which it belonged to. It is for this reason that Pietro Giarrè, a famous Florentine painter, was invited to decorate the villa.
The Villa is on four levels with the same internal disposition: the entrance is from the living room through which are reachable the other frescoed rooms.
The central floors, the noble ones, are completely restored and already habitable, though the attic floor, once used as a drying-room for fruit, still needs some works as the cellars also do.
The restoration needed especially by the attic room would include also the development of the living area by adding some other bathrooms, which are, compared to the bedrooms that the Villa currently has, lacking.
Each floor has an independent entrance and three of them are directly linked with the terraced garden.
The Renaissance part of the garden (Parco dei Fiori) is accessed through the Noble floor ; the camellia’s garden through the ground floor and the one with fruits through the cellars.
There is also a natural cavern under the ground which used to be a secret passage to the adjacent town. Though this is not practicable anymore, there is still an old boundary wall which dates back to the medieval age.
The property is completed by an attached outbuilding, currently lived in by the owner and a beautiful park with fountains powered by a small river above the property.
|
