Casa Arringo is a beautiful house on the edge of the historic centre of Piglio, with sweeping views of the valley, a small garden area, balcony, four or five bedrooms (depending how you want to use the space) and beautiful stone cellars. All of it is habitable, and all but three rooms and the cellars have been recently and attractively restored.

The main front door leads to a small entrance room. From here you ascend to the the main floor living area, which has a large living/dining room with corner kitchen and stone fireplace (and views across the valley), all fitted in solid wood. An archway leads to a cosy tv room.

A fine wooden staircase leads to the upper floor, which has three large bedrooms (two with views out over the valley), a walk-in storeroom and a very large bathroom.

This section has all been attractively and recently renovated, and can be lived in at once.

Returning to the entrance hall, you could reopen the doorway into the entrance vestibule of the other part of Casa Arringo, which is also habitable, but more dated and less recently restored. Here there is another bedroom, this one with original wood beams, and what is currently a living room with a wall kitchen, as well as a lovely balcony looking out over the green valley. This room also has original wood beams, although they are currently covered over. This could become a further bedroom, or a study, or the two rooms together could become a stunning master suite. There is also a bathroom.

From here you descend to another large room, with original terracotta floors, currently completely unused, and then down into the arched stone cellars, which owing to the slope of the land are at ground level outside the walls. You could make a lovely entertaining area and kitchen here: the cellars open out onto the little garden area, from which a gate leads to the street.

The lowest (garden) level can easily be reached by car, on a good but quiet road, where there is parking. The main front door can also be reached by car if necessary, although generally only locals (or very good drivers) brave the narrow cobbled streets of the historic centre.


PIGLIO AND THE CIOCIARIA

Piglio is a charming town, which (rather unusually) combines generally good street access with traditional cobbled alleyways. The home of Cesanese del Piglio DOC wine, it has an excellent yearly wine festival, and the town itself has a good selection of cafes, bars, restaurants and shops.

Piglio is part of the the Ciociaria. The Ciociaria region of Italy is within easy reach of both Rome and Naples and their respective airports. A day's shopping in Rome is a common pastime, while an even shorter drive brings you to the charming beaches south of Rome. Alternatively, drive east, and the mountains of the Abruzzo National Park await with horse trekking in the magnificent beech forests, and sparkling mountain lakes and rivers where you can swim in the heat of the summer.

Often overlooked, both by tourists and by those foreigners in search of an Italian home, in favour of the more publicized regions of Tuscany and Umbria, the Ciociaria remains largely an unspoilt gem with beautiful scenery and medieval hilltop towns. A home or second home in the Ciociaria, in the hilltop towns of Piglio, Anagni, Arpino, Veroli or in the rolling countryside that surrounds them, will afford you a setting where over two thousand years of history combine with an idyllic rural Italian lifestyle, where you can still discover the 'real' Italy and take time out from the busy crowds of the larger tourist cities, while being less than ninety minutes journey from central Rome or either of Rome's two airports.


VIA ROMANA Srls

Via Romana Srls is an Italian-incorporated company owned by a British/Australian Chartered Accountant and her photographer daughter, and offers a package of services to facilitate all aspects of the purchase and restoration of Italian property by overseas clients. The Via Romana team works in collaboration with various fully-licensed Italian real estate agencies.