Rancioli

Val d'Orcia, Tuscany

Property Description

Property 1319
10-21 Guests
12 Bedrooms
12.5 Bathrooms
1,000 square meters indoor
3 Hectares outdoor

Features

Overview

Rancioli offers guests a rich and authentic experience of a beautifully restored Tuscan farmhouse, surrounded by the unspoiled green of the Val d'Orcia countryside. This spacious private home celebrates the rustic appeal of an ancient 'casa colonica' in combination with a strong modern aesthetic, perfectly reflecting the owner's personal taste and style. Rancioli makes for a relaxed vacation without pretense, enriched by the essential pleasures of fresh air, good food and deep sleep. The setting provides ample opportunity to enjoy family and friends in an unhurried environment, largely removed from tourist crowds. Children have plenty of room to roam out of doors and excursions are easy. The house sits roughly one kilometer outside San Casciano dei Bagni, a charming and increasingly chic stone hill town, made famous by the opening of an exceptional luxury spa. Here you can live the village life firsthand, de-stress in thermal baths and wander as you will across Tuscany or Umbria. Rancioli offers a place where you can take each day in turn. You can fall asleep under a shady tree after lunch, swim by moonlight and forget time on a quiet back road.

When you are ready for delving into the rich cultural history of the area, you can choose among numerous excursions within 30 - 45 minutes, including well-known towns such as Montepulciano, San Quirico and Pienza. La Foce, especially for gardeners, and Bagno Vignoni, for anyone who wants to try a real Roman bath, make interesting day trips. Orvieto, Bagnoregio and Civita, reachable only on foot and therefore one of Italy's vanishing small towns, are in Umbria but close enough for a rewarding day trip. Chiusi is not to be overlooked either, the historic center up with a beautiful and important Etruscan museum, and the modern village below with excellent train service, reaching Florence or Rome in just over an hour.

Rancioli was originally restored in 1991, from a forgotten ruin once occupied by two large farming families who raised cows and planted grain. The house was further enhanced with a thoughtful renovation and refurbishment in recent years, which retained its strong lines and unsentimental attitude but added a bit more refinement, color and comfort. The result is a property that has kept pace with the local fashion for designer houses without sacrificing its own identity.

Rancioli stretches across an open hillside with a view of Mount Cetona to the north, requiring a 400 meter drive on a rough dirt road. Only two other houses can be seen on the opposite ridge, the distance between filled with lush forests of mostly oak trees. The lawn is broad and open, front and back, with a handful of tall shade trees and young flower beds. The west lawn, in front of the house, is marked by a spreading querce tree with comfortable seating underneath, as well as a new grapevine covered pergola for eight. The Dependence is set on a lower terraced lawn, with its own dining pergola and a series of raised beds for vegetables. The east lawn includes a canvas-covered dining patio alongside the house with a south-facing view. Ivory canvas curtains can be drawn to provide additional shade. Beyond the unstructured edge of the lawn is woodland with old, overgrown country roads still visible, and providing an invitation to guests of every age who enjoy wandering. The lawn at the south end of the house leads to an informal stone path and the large pool (8 x 17 meters) set on a partially shaded slope with a view across to the neighbors' old olive grove. There are sun beds for under the straw pergola, shade trees or in full sun. At one end is a rustic changing room with small fridge for cold drinks. The pool area has been lit for enjoyment at night.

This is a remarkable property, combining the classic beauty of Tuscan architecture and materials with the sure, contemporary design style of the Rome-based, art-gallery owner. Each room offsets the original architecture - old, handmade cotta- or travertine-tiled floors, tempera-painted cassettone ceilings and rough stucco walls - with carefully selected pieces from the owner's extensive collection of contemporary art and objects. Pale, color-washed walls mix casually with furniture constructed in a pared-down, modern style of basic materials - wood, stone and iron. Soft furnishings - ivory linen slipcovers, flower-print chairs, blue and white mattress-ticking bedspreads, simple hanging drapes of natural linen or cotton - are similar from room to room lending to the overall consistency and harmony of the house. There are doors opening to the surrounding lawns wherever possible, adding to the easy flow of living indoors and out. Every bedroom has one screened window for comfortable sleeping. The baths are all ensuite and designed for functionality; all but one are equipped with large stall or open showers. The tones are cool and soft and promote simple, good living.

Rancioli is distinguished by the staff - a team of two devoted women from the village who treat the property as their own and visitors as personal guests. They are of generous spirit and of enormous heart, helping transform a vacation at Rancioli into a cross-cultural exchange of pleasure and appreciation. The primary caretaker and cook is exceptionally talented and resourceful, finding mushrooms in the hills behind the house and transforming the spiny leaves of a nettle plant into succulent ravioli with the help of a local goat's cheese. It is these fundamental joys that have burnished the memories of many Rancioli guests over the years.

Layout

GROUNDS

GROUND FLOOR

COMMON AREA

BLUE WING

FIRST FLOOR

YELLOW WING

PINK WING

DEPENDENCE - on request only

IL CORTILE - by separate payment

Rental Notes

Points of Interest

Price

Price information available upon request.

Extras

Contact Information

Homebase Abroad, Ltd.
Two Hooper Street
Marblehead, MA 01945

Phone: (781) 639-4040
UK: +44-20-7084-6374
Fax: (781) 639-3050

© May 2012 by Homebase Abroad, Ltd. All rights reserved.

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