Today we don't know how to define certain jobs and certain relationships; Neither do certain hotels. Every time there is, here and there, more accommodations that we dare not to call hotels, with double, triple and even infinite reason for being: private club where you can sleep (Soho House opened that door to places like The Aster), hotels from the be a member (INNESS) restaurants with beds (Akelarre), one-bedroom hotels (Vipp Pencil Case), hotels-retirement (Sloop House or MasQi).
We neither know nor want to give them a name, because their charm lies in that fluid personality and attentive to his time. Life is not static: hotels don't belong either. It´s complicated.
Villa Lena, Italy.
Villa Lena It is one of those hotels that are what they want. This is a project of three creative minds, Lena Evstafieva, Jerome Hadey, and Lionel Bensemoun. who found a farm called San Michele and bought it next to the 19th century villa what was in it. The intention was to found and give a space to the Villa Lena Agritourism and Art Foundation, and these would materialize in a program of artist residencies and a hotel.
Villa Lena began with that double personality that today is multiple, because it includes apartments, medieval garden, artist studios and creative retreat center, but let's start at the beginning: for that moment in which we are arriving at Villa Lena, where no one appears by chance. It is in Toiano, between Pisa and Florence, and confirms that the word remote It does not mean a village in Burkina Faso, but any place that demands commitment. Villa Lena, requires own car (with good wheels), GPS and Biodramine.
Villa Lena, Italy.
Every traveler who arrives at the Tuscany brings your fantasy built from home: cinema and literature They have been in charge of feeding her. here we wait expatriate foreigners, wines at the end of the day (if they are grown nearby, the better), mansions with a chipped façade and paths flanked by cypresses. If we can't find it, we ask for the complaints book. You don't have to do it here, because imagination and reality they adjust and that is appreciated as soon as we approach the great villa, which with a gesture decadent and snob presides Villa Lena says hello. EITHER buongiorno.
Evalie Wagner, a floral artist and resident there during the fall of 2021, defines this place as follows: “It is a cosmos in itself, it seems the scene of Call me by your name by Guadagnino during the day and when the sun goes down, morphs into Jarmush's Only Lovers Left Alive." She shared wines at the end of the day with the guests and organized botanical workshops. The places belong to those who fill them with his spirit and their movements.
That mansion that we have seen when arriving a little dizzy belonged to Augusto and Tereza Del Frate, an aristocratic family that, oh, life, had to sell it. In inheritance they left some magnificent furniture and a ghost, the good one Elvira, who is not only harmless, but also pretty. This is the heart of Villa Lena, where the artists stay and where the appetizers once a week where they mingle with guests.
But let's continue. And where is the hotel? Twenty meters from this neo-Renaissance villa. There, brushing against it, is another building that we will soon find out they call The fattory, and so will we too. The door opens and a space emerges is all photogenic: soft armchairs, wild flower bouquets, good design. Here, in some old stables, the main rooms and some rooms in which to watch movies, read or work, because all that is done here.
Beatriz Tomás, from Betiglue.
The hotel It does not finish in the Fattoria: it is distributed in two other buildings in different parts of the estate, as if a albergo diffuse to treat There are six more rooms in San Michele, what they call the building next to the restaurant and bar; plus, (families and friends, listen up) there are five apartments in Renachi, a building that you reach after walking ten minutes, of course, among cypresses.
Here is challenged hotel holy trinity (sleep + shower + food) but welcome is everything that shakes and keeps a hotel alive. Beatriz Tomás, who before working for two months at the Foundation she met the hotel as a guest, She recounts her experience: “During the week that I was staying, I enjoyed perform yoga overlooking the valley of olive trees, I made several Creative workshops such as cyanotypes or flower arrangements Inspired by Japanese art ikebana. That same week I was able to make a olive oil tasting ecological, which they produce themselves on the farm. I finished my stay with an excursion looking for black truffles and a later cooking workshop”.
This describes the creative nature of the place that this Majorcan defines as "a destination in itself". That may be one way to define it and another is the one used by Villa Lena himself on her Instagram account, it is defined as “A creative and rare agritourism in the middle of the wildest Tuscany”. creative and weird sounds good.
Craveiral Farmhouse, Portugal.
There are places like this all over Europe . We find this multiple nature in Craveiral, in the Alentejo and also in the hotel Aristide, in Syros; the Chateau de la Haute Borde , in France or number twenty , in Florence, one hour from Villa Lena, which share with them the liquid personality. Whoever wants can enjoy it as a hotel, and that will be fine. Or it is possible to mix with the artists residence, visit them in their studios and share appetizer with them.
Or, to complicate the stay, it is possible do all that and participate in all the creative proposals that are offered, as Beatriz did, who is a firm defender of sustainability and, after her stay in Tuscany, has just founded in Majorca The Dressing Room. In fact, one of the reasons that interests her and other travelers the most is her focus on sustainable tourism. All these unstructured hotels they have something in common: the concern to leave the least negative trace around and the greatest positive trace.
Aristide Hotel Syros, Greece.
Villa Lena was a pioneer in this will. This is seen in what is expected and tangible, for example: the fruit and vegetables are produced on the farm and everything that is served, even the cola, is of Tuscan origin and the hotel is free of plastics. It is also in what is not seen: reusing, conserving, wanting to be a project that lasts for years, that contributes to the local economy and to landscape conservation and that nourishes the spirit of those who come here. They are hotels without a clear name, but they do have a surname: sustainable.
Hotels with dual personalities can be whatever they want, Also a retreat. Villa Lena welcomes these programs that grow and grow each year. these programs five to seven nights they bring together several activities under the same theme and in the post-pandemic society they balance controlled sociability and learning. They are very timely, that's why they are tempting.
This spring, Villa Lena will host a creative retreat, led by the potter Anne Kering (Kana London), another of yoga guided by nina butler and another of writing organized by Jade and Erin, founders of Trust&Travel. Retreats are content used by some hotels located in rural settings and yet another example that there are hotels that are what they really want.