Aus Gründen der Leistungsfähigkeit wird dieser blog öfter auf Englisch angeschlagen als auf Deutsch, obwohl Il Poggiolo mehr als glücklich ist, auf E-Mails und Anmerkungen in der Deutschen Sprache zu antworten.

Cennina Castle Keep, perched strategically on a steep hill (photo: O.Righi)

In 1968, a half-Italian half-French sculptor and ceramist, Osvaldo Righi, fell in love with the ruin of a 12th century castle. Situated on a hilltop in the Valdambra valley, which leads from the Valdarno into the province of Siena, this castle was once a fortress held by feudal nobility, protecting a small a village. The ruins and part of the village were for sale, and Osvaldo sank everything he had into acquiring what everyone told him would be his own ruin. The road was terrible, most of the village was abandoned, and the task of restoration hopeless.

Yet word spread, and by the summer of 1969 it was known through the grapevine from Florence to London to New York that it was possible to stay in Tuscany and help reconstruct Cennina in exchange for room and board. Young people from all over Europe and North America passed through Cennina, rebuilding medieval walls in exchange for copious amounts of pasta and local chianti wine, and in the next few years a cultural center was born for art exhibitions, concerts and summer seminars.

Today the cultural centre is still active in the summer months, and the concerts (of all kinds of music) are not to be missed. Osvaldo has also restored a few of the medieval living quarters into holiday apartments for rent, and has his own line of ceramic sculptural objects, table and glassware which can be consulted on the internet (see “Cennina Ceramics”). Do not miss a trip to Cennina when you are in the area, at any time of year.

Left: Cennina village

Right: Osvaldo Righi

Ceramic Ware by Osvaldo Righi

Sting and his wife Trudie Styler open an Organic Produce Shop in Figline Valdarno

The Sting Villa in Figline (Photo: courtesy of gonews.it)

In 1997 Sting and his wife Trudie bought Villa Il Palagio in Figline Valdarno. The estate consists of a large villa and woods, vineyards, olive groves, and a converted barn that functions as a recording studio. Situated in the Arno valley south of Florence (a leisurely 30 minute drive north from Il Poggiolo), Sting’s 900 acre estate now features a recently opened a shop that sells organic farm produce: wine, olive oil, honey and salami made from the famous “cinta senese” breed of pig . Until summer 2010 this produce was only available in luxury outlets in the US and Britain (such as Harrods in London), but now it is also available to visitors to the Valdarno at the shop called “Tenuta Il Palagio.” In an interview with a local television station, Sting declared: “When I came here I wanted first of all to feed my family with genuine foods and quality produce, grown in a healthy environment …. I also wanted to use agriculture with practices that would nourish, rather than deplete the land.”

For a bird’s eye view of the estate (it is off the Strada Provinciale 16 that goes from Figline to Greve in Chianti) look it up on Bing’s maps. For more details on how this estate was acquired and restored, check out the article in Food&Wine: “Sting & Trudie’s Tuscany: An Organic Tale” By Frank Digiacomo.

Sting with a basket of organic vegetables (Photo:courtesy lanazione.it)

The Shop in Figline (Photo: courtesy lanazione.it)

Lavender in a terracotta pot by Christina Randall

A couple of summers ago, the artist Eugenia Pell and her daughter Christina Randall (also a painter) came to Tuscany to find inspiration. The result of their sojourn was a wealth of paintings, photographs and drawings, most of which were done at Il Poggiolo. One of my favourites is the window that casts light on the landing of the Casa Colonica stairs (see below). Eugenia – known to her friends as Genii – has caught the very essence of the cracked paint and warm colours of the faded stucco.

Below are reproduced some of the artworks they made: a postcard of the laundry line, where clothes dry in the balmy summer breezes, parts of the garden, and especially the spent flowers, whose astral shape seems to have enchanted Genii. Originally blooming as a ball of lavender colour, these flowers fade to skeletal starbursts which we keep on the window sill all winter long.

Il Poggiolo - Garden view by Christina Randall

Casa Colonica: small window (Photo SMG)

Tuscan window by Eugenia Pell

Dried sunburst flowers on a windowsill (Photo SMG)

Sunburst flowers by Eugenia Pell