In Southern Tuscany, a New Bed and Breakfast Shared a Renovation Team With the Sistine Chapel | Vogue

"A 16th-century palazzo–turned–B&B in Orbetello—a peninsula surrounded by a lagoon in southern Tuscany—this rural idyll is an Italian interiors fantasy, and it must be the only bed and breakfast in the world to share a renovation team with the Sistine Chapel. Owned by stylist James Valeri (he’s Italian) and his husband Matthew Adams (he’s American), the house has been in Valeri’s family for about a century; after buying it, they left New York’s East Village for Italy to make it the perfect B&B. Because the Soprintendenza delle Belle Arti required strict preservation, it took a year just to secure approvals, and even the restorers had to be approved. The couple worked with Maria Rosaria Basileo and her five-strong all-female team—whose previous projects included the Sistine Chapel and the Villa Borghese—who stayed five months working with scalpels, slowly peeling away the paint; it was intense work. When you look at the place, that’s hardly surprising." - Mark Holgate