Abbadia d'Ombrone

Abbazia di Vallombrosa

Villa Arceno

Bardini Garden in Florence

Bernard Berenson

Boboli's Gardens

Il parco dei Mostri di Bomarzo

Villa Bottini

Castello di Brolio

Villa Cahen

Villa della Capponcina

Villa Capponi

Villa Medici at Careggi

Villa di Catignano

Cecil Ross Pinsent

Castello di Celsa

Villa Certano Baldassarrini

Certosa di Pontignano

Villa di Cetinale

Villa Chigi Saracini

Villa Farnese (Caprarola)

Gardens in Fiesole

Villa Gamberaia

Villa Garzoni in Collodi

Villa di Geggiano

Villa Grabau

Villa Guicciardini Corsi Salviati

Horti Leonini di San Quirico

Villa I Collazzi, Firenze

Iris Origo

L'Orto de'Pecci (Siena)


Villa I Tatti

Villa Medicea La Ferdinanda

Villa La Foce

Villa La Gallina in Arcetri

Villa Lante

Villa La Petraia

Villa La Pietra

Villa La Suverana in Casole d'Elsa

The Medici Villa at Careggi

Villa Medici in Fiesole, Firenze

Garden of Palazzo Medici-Riccardi in Firenze

Villa Medicea at Poggio a Caiano

Medici Villas in Tuscany

Villa di Monaciano

Giardino degli Orti Oricellari | Firenze

Orto Botanico, Siena

Villa Orlandini in Poggio Torselli

Il Palazzone

Villa Palmieri and Villa Schifanoiai

Villa Peyron al Bosco di Fontelucente

Palazzo Piccolomini in Pienza

Villa di Pratolino

Villa Reale di Marlia

Villa San Donato in Colle (Bagno a Ripoli)

Villa Santini Torrigiani

Villa di Vicobello

Villa Vistarenni

Il Vittoriale degli Italiani


 
Gardens in Tuscany
             
 

Villa di Geggiano

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Villa di Geggiano

   
   
Near Castelnuovo Berardenga, on the top of a hill covered in vineyards, stands Villa di Geggiano, belonging as of 1527 to the Bianchi Bandinelli family.
Villa di Geggiano was originally a rural construction which most likely dated back to the beginning of the 14th century. After being given to the Bianchi Bandinelli family (that has among his ancestors the Pope Alexander the 3rd), as the dowry of Girolama Santi when she married Girolamo Bandinelli in 1527, it was enlarged by adding a few rooms in keeping with the rebirth of spending summer vacations at a place in the country. Its appearance today is the result of radical rebuilding carried out during the marriage of Anton Domenico Bianchi Bandinelli with Cecilia Chigi Zondadari, which took place in 1768. The exceptional condition of the dwelling - the villa and the gardens -, including the perfectly kept, original 18th century treasure of furniture and decorations, is due not only to the stories of the various families that owned it in the past but also to the effort of the famous archeologist and art historian Ranuccio Bianchi Bandinelli (1900 - 1975), who made it his main residence and wrote about his love for the place and its preservation in order to share these things with his descendants, who today live and work there, a very special place indeed. In the year 2000 a major restoration project was started on both the villa and the gardens.

   
   
The rectangular villa spreads over three floors, with a central tower that adds an extra floor to the building. There are two blocks to the sides of the building: the one to the right contains the Madonna of the Rosary family chapel.
In addition to the Green Theater (Open Air Theatre), the villa has a very nice entrance room, which was painted in 1790 by Ignazio Moder, portraying the twelve months of the year, and a few rooms where one finds the original furniture in 'veneziano rustico' style and original French wall paper (Papiers Peintes) and fabrics (Toile de Jouy). Ignazio Moder was a travelling Tyrolean painter.

 

 

 

Park and Garden

 

The Villa di Geggiano and its gardens have been declared a Monumento Nazionale and constitute a phenomenon which is unique both historically and in terms of landscape gardening: its organic conservation of furniture and decorations take the visitor back to the atmosphere of an elegant 18th century vacation house. In the gardens, which are decorated with groups of century-old cypress trees, a parterre of boxtrees and hundreds of potted lemon trees, one finds the quaint Teatro di Verzura with two, late-baroque prosceniums in brickwork, decorated by the Maltese sculptor Bosio. Through one of the several, intermittent, monumental gates in the surrounding walls, one arrives at the Pomario, a mixture of flowerbeds and vegetable garden decorated with topiaries and a terrace fish pond from where one has a magnificent view over the neqrby city of Siena. It was in the Teatro di Verzura that Vittorio Alfieri staged a tragedy of his during one of his many stays at Geggiano, as a guest of Mario Bianchi Bandinelli, with whom he was very close friends.

The garden is divided into two areas: the one in front of the villa is known as the Piazzone, the other is the kitchen garden. The Piazzone is laid out parallel to the front of the building, with large lawns at the sides edged with low box hedges and ending at the southern end in the 18th-century teatro di verzura.The entire garden is surrounded by a high wall into which six gates open, flanked by monumental pillars crowned by terracotta vases and statues of monkeys. There are two openings to the south, at the sides of the theatre, two to the west, leading into the kitchen garden, one to the east, leading out to the countryside and one to the north, alongside the villa. The kitchen garden, which occupies a square portion of land to the west, ends in a semi-circular brickwork fishpond and is organised as an Italian-style garden with geometrical beds arranged around a well.

 

 

Paintings inside Villa Geggiano. Theinterior of the villa is preserved with original frescoes, textiles, floorsand furniture

 

Musica Reale is a recently started initiative to bring together members of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, in a variety of formations, for the performance of chamber music in all its aspects. All instruments being available in the orchestra, the choice of programming is enormous.
www.musica-reale.com
 
Villa di Geggiano
53019 Pianella (Siena) Italia
Tel. 0577 356 879
www.villadigeggiano.com
 
 
   
 
Villa Geggiano or Villa Bianchi Bandinelli, dates back to the 13th century, was renovated between 1780 and 1790. It forms, together with the surrounding garden, a very unusual complex, both from the historical and the landscaping point of view.

 

Green theatreGreen theatre

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Around 1768, in the occasion of the wedding of Anton Domenico Bianchi Bandinelli with Cecilia Chigi, Malavolti widow, the building was completely transformed in a grand villa with a garden surrounded by a wall and with a greenery theatre. Vittorio Alfieri, who stayed for short periods at the villa, acted some of his tragedies just in the greenery theatre. In its splendour times the villa has been frequented by Montale, Saba, Guttuso and Stendhal. Recently the villa gave hospitality to the set of the movie Stealing beauty. Bernardo Bertolucci's Io ballo da sola (I dance alone) was filmed in the villa.
A long tree-lined avenue, with cypresses in the first part and holm-oaks further on, leads all the way to the entrance gate, parallel to the teatro di verzura, the outdoor theatre on the south side of the garden.

Adorned with century-old cypresses and potted lemon plants and clipped box hedging, the garden boasts a unique Green theatre. This slightly raised theatre is surrounded by tall laurel hedges and consists of a proscenium made up of twin arches, surmounted by triumphal pediments into which the crests of the Bianchi Bandinelli and Chigi Zondadari families are inserted. The arches have niches containing the statues of Tragedy and Comedy, by the Maltese sculptor Bosio. Vittorio Alfieri, a family friend, performed one of his tragedies here in the late 18th century. It’s called teatro di verzura (greenery theatre) because the scenes are built by cypresses and laurel hedges.


  The proscenium of 18th century greenery theatre comprises two twin arches, crowned by triumphal frontons bearing the courts of arms of the Bianchi Bandinelli and Chigi Zondadari families. The arches are decorated with niches containing statues of Tragedy and Comedy.  

 

Film

Villa di Geggiano has been chosen over the years for many TV and film productions. Among the most famous usage of the Villa was for “Stealing Beauty” by Bernardo Bertolucci, in which Liv Tyler debuted.

 

Stealing Beauty, the set in Villa Geggiano
The filming of Bertolucci's Stealing Beauty [1]

 

In Stealing Beauty, a film by the great director Bernardo Bertolucci, a young 19 year old girl, played by Liv Tyler travels to the Tuscan countryside to find her true father. The film focuses on an American teenage girl who travels to a lush Italian villa to stay with family friends of her poet mother who recently committed suicide. The film was actress Liv Tyler’s first lead role, which garnered her critical attention, and because of this, is often seen as a starting point for her film career.

Movies set in Tuscany | Stealing Beauty (Io ballo da sola) (Bernardo Bertolucci, 1996)

 

Io ballo da sola (1996) from Il Tesoro di Siena on Vimeo.

Villa di Geggiano is a member of the Grandi Giardini Italiani, an association of major gardens in Italy. Its members include some of the most important gardens in Italy.
List of member gardens | Fondazione Pompeo Mariani (Imperia), Giardini Botanici di Stigliano (Roma), Giardini Botanici di Villa Taranto (Verbania), Giardini Botanici Hanbury (Ventimiglia), Giardini della Landriana (Roma), Giardini La Mortella (Napoli), Giardino Barbarigo Pizzoni Ardemani (Padova), Giardino Bardini (Firenze), Giardino dell'Hotel Cipriani (Venezia), Giardino di Boboli (Firenze), Giardino di Ninfa (Latina), Giardino di Palazzo del Principe, Giardino di Villa Gamberaia (Firenze), Giardino Ducale di Parma, Giardino Esotico Pallanca (Imperia), Giardino Giusti (Verona), Giardino Storico Garzoni (Pistoia), Gardens of Trauttmansdorff Castle (Merano), Giardino del Biviere (Siracusa), Serraglio di Villa Fracazan Piovene (Vicenza), Vittoriale degli Italiani (Brescia), Cervara, Abbazia di San Girolamo al Monte di Portofino (Genova), Venaria Reale, Museo Giardino della Rosa Antica (Modena), Museo Nazionale di Villa Nazionale Pisani (Venezia), Oasi di Porto (Roma), Orto Botanico dell'Università di Catania, Palazzo Fantini (Forlì), Palazzo Parisio (Malta), Palazzo Patrizi (Roma), Parco Botanico di San Liberato (Roma), Parco del Castello di Miramare (Trieste), Parco della Villa Pallavicino (Verbania), Parco della Villa Reale di Marlia (Lucca), Parco di Palazzo Coronini Cronberg (Gorizia), Parco di Palazzo Malingri di Bagnolo (Cuneo), Parco di Pinocchio (Pistoia), Parco Giardino Sigurtà (Verona), Parco Idrotermale del Negombo (Napoli), Parco Paternò del Toscano (Catania), Parco Storico Seghetti Panichi (Ascoli Piceno),   Varramista Gardens (Pisa), Villa Arvedi (Verona), Villa Borromeo Visconti Litta (Milano), Villa Carlotta (Como), Villa del Balbianello (Como), Villa della Porta Bozzolo (Varese), Villa d'Este (Como), Villa d'Este (Tivoli), Villa di Geggiano (Siena), Villa Durazzo (S. Margherita Ligure, GE), Villa Farnese di Caprarola (Viterbo), Villa Grabau (Lucca), Villa La Babina (Imola), Villa La Pescigola (Massa), Villa Lante (Viterbo), Villa Melzi d'Eril (Como), Villa Montericco Pasolini (Imola), Villa Novare Bertani (Verona), Villa Oliva-Buonvisi (Lucca), Villa Peyron al Bosco di Fontelucente (Firenze), Villa Pisani Bolognesi Scalabrin (Padova),   Villa Poggio Torselli (Firenze), Villa San Michele (Napoli), Villa Serra (Genova), Villa Trento Da Schio (Vicenza), Villa Trissino Marzotto (Vicenza), Villa Vignamaggio (Firenze).
Grandi Giardini Italiani (Italian) | www.grandigiardini.it 

 

Podere Santa Pia where you toast the beauty and bounty of the Maremma overlooking the shimmering Tyrrhenian.


Villa is Tuscany

Located on the outskirts of Castiglioncello Bandini, in a hilly and unspoilt land, Podere Santa Pia is one of the best places to slow traveling in Tuscany. This formal cloister offers a slow traveler's guide to Italy and the Italian way of life, designed to inspire and entice people to travel deeper instead of wider,to explore the, beautiful nature reserves and nearby unspoilt beautiful beaches,
and the most interesting artistic, historical and cultural sites of southern Tuscany that and are awaiting your discovery.

Artist and writer's residency | Holiday houses in Tuscany | Podere Santa Pia


[1]
Source: www.villadigeggiano.com

 


Podere Santa Pia
Podere Santa Pia, view from the garden
on the valley below

Il parco dei Mostri di Bomarzo