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Exclusive Elegant Renaissance apartment in the Palazzo Angelio, a
Medici Palace.
Overlooks bustling piazza located in tthe heart of Barga one of Italy’s most beautiful cities.
300 square meters (3,000 square feet) of renaissance grandeur
Grand Salon and Formal Dining Salon with huge hewn stone hearths
library/media room with fireplace
Three bedrooms, three baths
Modern kitchen
Two balconies facing southwest
Magnificent views from every room
Housekeeping, concierge and catering services
Paradise for lovers of art and culture, food, cafe society and nature and sports
THE PALAZZO ANGELIO APARTMENT:
Each time one enters, one experiences a uniqueness of being, an authentic, original renaissance aesthetics, a grandiose inspiration of its spaces, stylistic purity. Impossible to imitate, the calm nobility, self confidence, the festive mood and the exquisite harmony of style elevate the spirit.
The apartment’s unusually large rooms, its largest salon in town, mark it as a presentation piece, a place of prestige, a “piano nobile”.
The flat occupies the “piano nobile” (elegant main floor) of the palazzo Angelio (named after a famous poet whose bust adorns the facade) on Barga’s centrally located piazza Angelio.
The Medici coat of arms designate it as having been one of the town’s prime residences in the service of administration, commerce and the arts. Very spacious rooms are arranged in palazzo fashion with a sequence of long vistas. A sense of ease and noble grandeur prevails.
The rooms are furnished with antiques and contemporary pieces, a blending of elegance and comfort. The flat's approximately 300 square meters (3,000 square feet) are decked with five hundred year old beamed and paneled chestnut ceilings between four and five meters high (14 - 18 feet) .
Its intricately patterned parquet floors of East African teak and ebony are irreplacable.
A formal dining room, the entrance hall, is centered on an enormous hefty renaissance hewn stone hearth, priceless in its craftmanship and value.The grand salon holds another finely hewn hearth topped by a relief of leaves and an angel as the center piece.
The library/media room has yet another fireplace, smaller, yet fully functioning, with comfortable furniture inviting to informal meals, gatherings and the enjoyment of TV/video/music . Modern kitchen and amenities and restored '70's style bathrooms assure a comfortable stay.
The bedrooms are spacious, comfortable and bright, well lit, each with a exquisite views, each with a writing desk and a seating area for being alone time and privacy of access.
Two bedrooms have a suite character with a joining bathroom and doors separating the unit from common spaces.
The flat has magnificient views from each room. On its side that looks into the city huge windows offer a a “prime seat” to watching the activities of the Piazza Angelio below: regular year- round fairs, historical pageants, the frequent parades where the whole town gathers and prosecco flows, and open-air concerts of classical and pop music.
Two sunny balconies, - one from the Grand Salon and one accessible from a bedroom suite -, show off New Barga’s elegant art neouveau villas, and beyond a broad valley the breathtaking panorama of the dramatic peaks of the magnificent Appenine and the Appuan Alps where nature remains untarnished and where Michelangelo personally supervised the quarrying of the marble for his statue of David.
The mountains’ deeply green slopes are dotted with dreamy ancient villages, (such as the famous Somma Colonia) perched loftlily yet firmly on rocky plateaus and jutting outcrops sparkling at night with light like stars.
When night falls the traffic from New Barga silences to a deep peace broken at dawn by the chorus of an army of song birds chirping from the near-by park, sweet nightingales at times among them.
The CITY of BARGA:
The “jewel in the crown” of Tuscany's unspoiled Garfagnana, one of Italy's officially designated most beautiful medieval walled cities. (Una dei piu belle borghi d'Italia)
-- (Check out barganews.com) -- Historically allied with Florence and wealthy due to its silk production, “Barga vecchia” recalls the height of Tuscan civilization with its Medici coat-of-arms and its noble palazzi.
Churches with art treasures, tiny gardens with roses, luminous geraniums everywhere, medieval passages and the mighty romanasque Duomo mounting an impressive summit bespeak an unbroken civilzation.
The views and the magic of bright chimes pierce the clear air and take your breath away. Its elevation, about six hundred meters above sea level, offers relief from Tuscany’s oppressive lowland summer heat. Its grandiose natural beauty and proximity to the Italian Riviera (Viareggio) make the city and its surrounding region a desired summer retreat for prominent Italian families. A population of about 10,000 inhabits the surrounding villages and the “new town” where most of the stores are located.
There is a lively contemporary energy, the region’s young people “hang out”, the weekly Saturday market takes place, with food, clothes, household goods, textiles and even antiques traded. Barga offers the full range of city services such as a hospital, (emergency room services are free in Tuscany) car rental, banking, post office, internet cafes, book stores, etc.
A bridge in the shadow of an ancient Roman aqueduct separates “Barga Vecchia” (Old Barga) from the new part. Old Barga is center stage for all year round regular fairs, pageants, parades and a veritable “theatre of life” with children at play, working artists and writers from different countries chatting with local people, restaurants and cafes, a vital community small enough to feel intimate and to be enjoyed by all -- and without automobile traffic! A sense of urbanity prevails.
Off season, in autum, the town and the region stage festivals and a very pageant driven Christmas season make it ideal for a unique experience. During a day of snow and wind the facades of the palazzi and the narrow streets make an indelible impression of solemnity and dignity in constrast to the warmth of the cafes and restaurants.
Services: cleaning, concierge, and catering possible
THINGS TO DO:
Food:
Walk to fabulous deli shopping and dining experiences with regional specialties.
Within 100 meters of the front door are three piazzas with bars, cafes, wine shops, an Italian ice-cream cafe and fine restaurants.
Art and Culture:
Art galleries, antique shops, a public library and a private English language library are in place for the art and literature lover.
An enchanting 17th century opera house, fully restored, adds red velvet seats and cultural finesse to Barga’s visitor. Performances are being offered throughout the year by travelling stage companies. In the height of summer an exquisite opera Barga festival attracts an international audience. In nearby Castelnuovo, the county seat, New York’s International Music Academy holds is summer venue with concerts throughout the day in a lovely theatre.
Promising young artists from all over the world perform.
For jazz lovers there is a well established jazz club with regular weekend performance and in the height of summer the beats of drums and the sounds of saxophones resound from the piazzas.
SURROUNDINGS:
Nature
Garfagnana's splendid nature begins at the city's gates, with well marked trails, a dream for the hiker.
In spring and summer, the deep forests and meadows- home to wild boars - (a dish specialty of the region) and mushrooms, are ablaze with wild crocus, narcissus. The ancient dry walls bordering roads and trails are covered with fragrant violets, capers and other wild flowers and herbs.
All is part of an extensive national “nature park” system, the forests abound with streams, wildlife and fish, and a network of shelters accomodates overnight hikers. The Appuan Alps, accross the valley, hold limestone caves, many as yet unexplored.
The Serchio river in the valley is one of Europe’s clearest and is stocked with salmon and trout. Its broad alluvial palins are ideal for horse-back riding and its roads ideal for bicycling. In summer, one can encounter groups of cyclists numbering in the hundreds and the curvy mountain roads are coursed by sport motorcyclists.
Villages
The Garfagnana is known for its magic villages, accessible also by car and local buses and small stony roads some of which dating back to Roman times.
There, time seems to have stood still. In some, a haunting vacuousness rules. Seemingly ancient women knitting in the warming sun or tending their geraniums speak of different times, when the village was full of life, when they bade “farewell” to their young men leaving for the New World or other European countries to escape poverty.
Churches, mostly empty on Sundays, with impressively large bell towers are balanced on impossibly steep rocks over a deep abyss their grey stones pockmarked by the ravages of time and yet enlivened through the vitality of wild flowers and ferns pushing through crevises of steps and exterior walls.
Sports
Barga's equestrian club offers beautiful horses for fifteen euros per hour.
Local gymnasium, golf, mountaineering, spelunking, swimming at the local pool and skiing at Italy’s famous ski area, Abetone (winter).
Good Rail and bus service to/from Lucca, Pisa, Florence, Sienna, Livorno
Ferry service from Livorno to Elba, Palermo and the entire Mediterranean
Local car rental.
Airports at Pisa and Florence.
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