Archive for 'Architectural Gems'

Cinephiles who are looking to enjoy a movie while staying in one of our vacation rentals in Florence will likely find the beautiful Giunti Odeon Libreria e Cinema to be a dream spot to spend hours reading books, enjoying a coffee, and catching a movie! Located inside a historic building and bringing together three wonderful businesses under one especially lovely roof, it creates a dream cultural hub for locals and visitors alike who are exploring the city. 

If you book a villa in Tuscany and decide on one destination – a vacation rental on the Tuscan Coast, for example, or a holiday rental in Florence – but you also want to see the famous city of Pisa on a day trip, then that is pretty easily arranged. Tuscany is a diverse, fascinating, and large enough region but not so big that day trips between different cities or areas is overly challenging. What can be more difficult, however, is if you want to see as much of the region as is possible and you only have a day to spend in any one destination. In this case, what do you prioritise? Well, we’re here to help with our handy guide of what to do if you only have a day (12 hours) in Pisa!

Casa Farfalla is already a luxury villa in Tuscany that we love to recommend and to share as it boasts incredible views from its panoramic location over the surrounding rolling green hills of the Tuscan countryside and the famous town of Lucca as well as incredibly chic and sleek modern interiors. For those who care about design and love art, it is a perfect place to stay but it has also contributed to, and inspired, the world of design in its own right…

Inspired by the shutters of the villa, the owners (artists, architects, and interior designers Michel and Donia Boucquillon) were invited by the beloved and well-known coffee and homeware brand ALESSI to create a collection for the company based on this striking design. 

There are an endless list of places to visit while enjoying a stay in a villa with pool in Tuscany that could compete for best view but many of these spots are in and around the famously picturesque area known as the Orcia Valley. This part of Tuscany epitomises the renowned beauty of the Tuscan countryside – think rolling green hills swathed in thin bands of fog in the early mornings and lit with golden light in the evenings, pretty and historic villages perched overlooking the valleys, cypresses lining winding roads, vineyards and olive groves stretching out to the horizon. It is an area of true pastoral perfection and one of the best places to enjoy these views, among all the amazing candidates, while staying in a vacation rental in the Orcia Valley, is from the gardens of the Palazzo Piccolomini.