Thursday Doors, 27/5/21: Villa Cetinale 1.

• Manja Maksimovič

I’m immensely pleased that I’m able to share with you some freshly acquired doors. I present you Villa Cetinale from my Sunday’s three-garden open-door tour.

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Let’s start at the beginning, I say. Today you are welcome to wait with me for 22 minutes, which is the delay with which the first gate of the day opened in front of Villa Cetinale, 20 minutes west of Siena and 1.5 h north of me.

I should know by now that in Italy it’s useless to plan anything tightly because your plan will collapse after the first item in your itinerary. And yet, when I was booking the tours online, the organiser ADSI offered me time slots to choose from. So I did and I had two gardens waiting soon after, which is why I spent much less time here than I would have liked. These gardens are truly astonishing.

You can read all about Villa Cetinale in detail and see its insides – which we didn’t – on its website, suffice to say that a former member of British Parliament Antony Lambton bought it in 1977 after a prostitute scandal and resignation, and worked on the house and the gardens with his partner Claire Ward (mother of actress Rachel Ward) until his death in 2006.

After that the villa has become available for rent. What are you waiting for? We could be neighbours!

Today we cover the front of the house and next week we attack from the rear where gardens start for real.

I apologise for the cloud blobs but the day was tricky for photography and the time of day was the worst for taking photos (as Cee tells us here). As I like to say: bad for photos, good for me.

The Latin motto of the villa above the main door, partially obscured in my photo towards the end, has been translated as: “Whoever you are who approach, that which may seem horrible to you is pleasing to me. If it appeals to you, remain. If it bores you, go away. Each is equally agreeable to me.” I like that. It could be the motto of my blog.

And I like it how Tina described my Lens-Artists Blues and Greens post in her comment: “Here in the US we have the phrase ‘an embarrassment of riches'”. This goes for sure somewhere on my new blog. Not yet time for that though.

And nothing to be embarrassed about. It’s just a villa…

  • The first photo of the day while waiting. The look to the left where I drove in.
  • Waiting like this for the gate to open. I took the last available 10 am slot.
  • The look to the right. An approach was called for.
  • There you go. I love the light in Italy. The first hour of my drive was completely covered with no light seeping through and I was afraid it would continue.
  • The little sign says this is Sovicille municipality.
  • And we are on. The 26th National Open Courtyard and Garden Day, organised by ADSI.
  • The first peek at the villa.
  • A quick door overview. This one proved important. You will learn why next week.
  • This one remained closed. Everything is rather meticulous, especially by Italian standards.
  • Must be the chapel.
  • A closer look.
  • And another. I like this combo of textures.
  • Either a huge mousehole or a really small doorway.
  • A look sideways. Next week we will continue where those two are standing.
  • These statues are “Spring” and “Summer”, the website says.
  • This path leads around the villa on the left.
  • I approve of this green.
  • Here we go, the main entrance. Clearly the villa is not occupied right now. Pounce!
  • I had to peek through the rails. You can see some of the motto above.
  • Villa Cetinale: when life gives you lemons, you know what to do.

The second part of this visit on my blog is here.

For Thursday Doors challenge hosted by Dan at No Facilities

This day in my blogging history

43 thoughts on “Thursday Doors, 27/5/21: Villa Cetinale 1.”

  2. That looks like it was a wonderful tour. I like all the doors, but I love the doors on the chapel the most. I also really like the gates!

    I’m having to type this comment in Notepad so I can paste it in. Otherwise, I keep getting pulled back into the gallery as I try to type in the comment block.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    1. Oh, Dan, I know, you’ve been telling me this and I’m truly sorry, but I have no idea how to go about fixing it, other than changing my gallery type but I really don’t wish to do that because finally I’m really happy with how my photos are displayed. Thank you for your patience and for leaving a comment at all. And I’m really glad you like this post. More from this day coming up.

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  9. Beautiful villa and thank you for taking time to visit it! Love the chapel in stone, but I wonder why they don’t repair the doors? (rhetorical Q.!)
    Do you have the background Canard – I changed to that one about a month ago, but your post background looks different… (because of the text on top of the featured image of the post …Or partly? Can you tell, I’m confuse?. I know you’re much more blog savvy than I am, so you probably could make use of two blog background at the same time, haha. Jesh

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  11. I a-door your doors (sorry), but seriously. I still haven’t got the word for a door enthusiast but I’m going to call it a portaphile (as in portal, or porte in French). Never has such an abundant contrast of doors been presented as here! 😀 I love the mouse-hole archway 🙂

    Great shot of you and your friend in front of the stairway to what looks like heaven. And a gorgeous quaint picture postcard photo at the bottom, very painterly. I enjoyed the motto too!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    1. Thank you kindly, Sunra Nina. 🙂 (I like both your names together like this.) Portaphile is a really good word and I shall introduce it to the door crowd one day. I like contrasting doors, they tell the story of humanity. That friend is my mom. I know! Hard to believe it. She keeps telling people that she had me at 12. 😀 The last postcard was taken with the borrowed pro camera, my first test of such a machine. It was quite impressive.

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      1. I like you putting my names together like that too 😊 (I do have far too many somehow!) Feel free to add portaphile to your vocabulary. Alohomora is the spell to unlock doors by the way! (In Harry Potter, lol, in case you need it 😂)

        That’s your MOM?! She must have been 12! Though someone would need arresting at this point. Which means your dad 😂 Think I’ll stop here before it gets worse!

        I look forward to more nuns and topless mystery men. Have a gorgeous weekend, Manja ❤️

        Liked by 1 person

      2. Hhaha, thanks for the chuckle. 😀 Can’t promise many of those last, sorry! Alohomora reminds me of A lo mejor (Spanish for “maybe”), as it gets repeated in one part of the much adored Spanish youth TV series Blue Summer (Verano azul). I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of it.

        Liked by 1 person

  12. I continue to live vicariously through you! These are gorgeous – my favorite is that little baby door (or huge mouse hole). My imagination can just run wild here with stories…

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  17. Hey Manja,
    Everytime I scroll through one of your post I want to go to Italy. The buildings and the doors are awesome. But the glimpse of the garden is amazing. You’re right about them being meticulous. Wow!

    Pat

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
  18. Pingback: Thursday Doors 17/6/21: Villa Cetinale 2. – Manja Mexi Mexcessive

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