Make Your Roman Holiday a Royal Holiday. New in the Royal Holiday Collection for 2013
Part of the fun of any visit to Italy is the experience of a history that goes way, way back.
It can seem to be crashing everywhere around you. From the omnipresent Ancient world – to the middle ages somehow always in the shadows of the spectacular Italian Renaissance. From the age of the Merchant Republics – Venice and Genoa – and in Rome – the Papal States, the crowning moment reached its Zenith in the long 19th century.
Visitors often find that long century one of the biggest obstacles to really seeing the long history of Italy. A big, important century, the Resorgimento – the unification – literally took almost the entire thing – usually described as 1815 to 1870. And with one unified Italy, rebuilding could take place in earnest. That’s a lot of what we see today.
The Residenza Villa Marignoli
Residenza Villa Marignoli
Few properties in the Royal Holiday collection can boast this importance in terms of architectural history, but then, Royal Holiday visitors only stay at a few places in the Eternal City. The Residenza Villa Marignoli is one of the most successful works of architect Giulio Magni – and one of our only properties with its own Wikipedia entry (albeit, in Italian only.)
Magni worked for a decade from – 1895 – in Bucharest, Romania – one of the hotbeds of late 19th century building. His 1904 return to Rome was met with contracts to build villas literally all over the city and many of which are still occupied today. He also built the small and still charming Velletri Station just outside Roma, the Church of Santa Maria Regina Pacis in Ostia, the Waldensian Faculty of Theology in Rome, and the Peace Palace in the Hague.
While Italian Neoclassical architecture left the biggest imprint on the country’s earlier 19th century architectural heritage, like most of the continent, when the first rays of the 20th century were dawning, the movement went towards Arte Nouveau, and in Italy, “Stile Libre.”
The Villa Marignoli, planned and finished in 1907, is among the most successful of the architects mid-career projects.
Now renowned as a lovingly restored mid-term to long-term guest house, the Villa has hosted filmmakers like Federico Fellini, Pietro Notarianni, Dario Argento and playwright Giuseppe Manfridi.
Royal Holiday travelers stay in elegant two or four guest suites. With private entrances, fully outfitted kitchens, and one or two bedrooms, there are few other places in the center of Rome with so much for so little.
Residenza Villa Marignoli
With Wi-Fi throughout, this is a big city experience, exotic and right in the place where you imagine yourself. (Like when Julia Roberts and Clive Owen wake up and decide they should live like this forever.) Linen is changed weekly and there’s laundry service on request – and you’re right in the heart of Rome.
You’re walking distance from the Villa Borghese park, with art galleries, fountains, and boating lake. The Viale Regina Margherita needs to be seen to be believed and the shops on Via Veneto are but 10-15 minutes walk away. All of the shops around the Spanish Steps are another 15 minutes walk and the Trevi Fountain are but a 20 minute walk
The Metro is called Barberini and connects you with everything in the city, and it’s safe, fast and fun. Piazza Republicca and the Opera House are but one metro stop away, St Peter’s Basilica and the Vatican Museums are four stops away.
Spaces are very limited in this exceptional property. But really, when is the last time you were in Rome?
Plan carefully. We’ll help. And we’ll get you back for an exceptional week when you can see and do, and do again, everything you remember.
