After and before
Now and then
Before and after
Over the past couple of years I have written quite a bit about Villa Fiorentina and its owner so I shall not bore you with repetition here. If you wish to read my essays on this subject look in the Labels list on the right and click on "Roderick Cameron" and "Villa Fiorentina".
To see what the inside of Fiorentina was like go here, here, and for a more comprehensive look at Fiorentina and its owners, here in the Labels list to the right.
A correspondent sent me the first photograph and link to the architect's site yesterday and you can imagine how grateful I am. Thank you TT.
The new photographs from here (Bruno Bolzoni Architecte D.P.L.G.) Attributions for other photographs where known will be found in the Labels list.
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What a treat! I'd love to see it in person, as perhaps it looks better than in these snapshots. But the "before" is a hard act to follow.
ReplyDeleteThe Devoted Classicist, thank you.
DeleteI agree that the "before" is a hard act to follow but clearly someone though they had done so. I do not have a problem with the pink except for the balance between it and color of the temple front - and whoever thought the tympanum needed to be pink .... !
I've been crestfallen about the house since the Billy Baldwin designed-furnishings were auctioned and have feared that wealthy Russians would taint or eradicate all that was good about it. Your photos are disconcerting; especially those two big mirror balls out front and that eye-searing new color. Promise me you won't show the interiors should you come across them! I couldn't bear it. Soon, if not now, Villa La Fiorentina will only exist as a state of mind.
ReplyDeleteMichelle from Boston, thank you.
DeleteI think Roderick Cameron's version is a state of mind already given its mythic status. For me, Billy Baldwin's version, and only in comparison with Cameron's, is awkward.
I really do wonder what the inside is like.
Of course the possession of money does not equate to the possession of good taste. Gaudy, ostentatious and unfortunate describe my feelings about the destruction of the previously elegant Villa. You should show the interior when possible, as a lesson to those with too much money and not enough sense.
ReplyDeleteNot Scarlett, thank you.
DeleteThere are many, many examples of the inequality between money and taste but I wonder if this new version of Fiorentina is as quite as tasteless as it might appear at first glance.
That is some sculpture in the swimming pool.
ReplyDeleteReggie Darling, thank you. The more I look at it the more I agree with you. My apologies for the late reply.
DeleteI spend part of every summer in this neck of the woods and have always wanted to see the Fiorentina but sadly (or perhaps blessedly) I don't know anyone who knows the current owners. Maybe this year; I shall keep you informed...
ReplyDeleteIrish Aesthete, thank you.
DeleteWe have visited the area once and found that Fiorentina sits, not surprisingly, inside what we now think of as a gated community. I would love to know, as would many readers, who now owns it.
Apparently it is owned by Charlene de Carvalho-Heineken, the beer heiress, who inherited it from her father.
ReplyDeleteThe current owner of Villa Fiorentina is Curt Engelhorn (Bayer Group) http://virtualglobetrotting.com/map/countess-therese-de-beauchamps-house-former/view/google/
ReplyDelete