Tour of the Count's Apartment

Frescoed Ceiling

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     While at the Villa, we were given the opportunity to tour the apartments of the Count who rents out the Villa to the program participants. The groundskeeper only opens the apartments once a semester for the students and faculty to see, so it was the only chance we were given to take in the true beauty of the Villa rooms.

     Our first stop was the office of our program director. It featured a beautifully frescoed ceiling that depicted various gods and scenes from Villa life. One of these scenes was of one of the Villa's courtyards; the other was of the front of the Villa itself.

     Our second stop in the Villa was a long room just off of the entrance. It featured two tables holding various art books with some depictions of what Villa life was like in Sesto Fiorentino. This room also included busts of various relatives of the Count and paintings of his family as well. There was also an amazing gold mirror with matching table featured in this room, which I was most intrigued by.

Mirror and Table

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     Then we entered a smaller living room that basically housed various pieces of art work, mostly paintings of the Count's relatives.

     Each of the rooms featured its own unique lighting. I loved these chandeliers the most because of their eleoquence and their ability to twist and curve while still giving off adequate light to the space. My favorite of these was featured above the dining room table. It gave the room a great ambiance and I could imagine the Count having some great Italian meal with friends and family.

     Inside his apartment area was also a library that held hundreds of books. Professor Mariotti didn't know how old they were, but many of them looked like they had been kept in the family for hundreds of years. I, being a book fanatic myself, loved this room and was kind of envious of the Count's great collection. Obviously, we weren't allowed to pick them up and look through them. However, since they were in Italian, I wouldn't be able to read them anyway.

Dining Room and Chandelier

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     The last room on our tour was another extremely long room. Professor Mariotti explained to us that the rooms were constructed in a long manner so that when it was hot in the summer time they could open the doors on both ends of the room and allow the wind to create its own kind of air conditioning. This room had more of a formal seating area and the paintings in this room depicted the Count's relatives dancing and playing the piano and other instruments. It is thought that this room was originally the music room in the Villa, but has since lost its grand piano that was featured in one of the paintings.

     Also found in this room were two more great chandeliers; each matching each other of course, and also somewhat "related to" the other chandeliers found throught the Count's apartments. On one side of this room stood a tremendous fire place, countered on the other side of the room by a painting of Sesto, another bust, and two vases that depict the coat of arms of the Count's family.

Porcelain vase with the Count's coat of arms

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     Just off of this room was a door that lead to the formal gardens. From there our tour of the Count's apartment ended, as we have access to the gardens throughout the semester. I will include pictures of the formal gardens later on as the weather continues to get nicer and the flowers (which will include hundreds of roses) start to bloom. Right now the gardens have a sad mood to them since the main color (brown) belongs to the stones and the walls.