Restored podere in the Romagna hills

The house sits at the top of its own hill, five minutes off the main road above Faenza, where the last stretch of Via Giovanni Collina climbs through vineyards and simply ends at the house. The farmhouse is old and the restoration is recent, so the shell is Romagna stone and render while everything inside is new: pale walls, timber ceilings, soft linens, and windows that hold the hills like paintings.

The house is divided into four apartments, each one entirely private and each opening to the outdoors. Two are one-bedroom, made for couples; two have a second bedroom and take four. All four share the same language of quiet rooms and clean light, and all four have a kitchen and living area of their own, so a stay can be as sociable or as solitary as guests want it. Taken together the podere sleeps twelve, which makes it as easy to book for two as for a family gathering or a group of friends travelling together.

Outside, the infinity pool is the centre of the day. It runs to the edge of the hillside and appears to spill into the vineyards below, with a Mediterranean garden of lavender, olive and cypress around it and a full circle of countryside beyond. In the early evening the plain turns gold as far as the coast, and the only sound is the wind moving through the vines. Walking and cycling routes leave from the gate and thread out through the surrounding hills.