How we were yesterday …

It all started on August 22nd, 1942, with the marriage of Matilde and Arturo Giarandoni who, with their new family, went to live in a typical Apennine stone house in the village called “Ca’ de’ Gatti”, located in that portion of the “small Cassia” street that leads from Tolè to Rocca di Roffeno. The years passed, the family moved into a new house, and the three children born from that union become adults and took different paths. In 1984, when in Italy homefarms were beginning to take their first steps, Paolo, the smollest of three children (better to say the youngest, considering that he is 1.90m. tall), who was always fascinated from the family home, started a new adventure, beginning the restructuring and giving new life to the initial nucleus of the homefarm “La Fenice”..

The name “La Fenice” (the Phoenix) came spontaneously, as if the place itself had chosen it.
During the restructuring, a metal plaque was found engraved with one date, 1860, a drowing and the name “La Fenice”; it was natural, therefore, to use that name for the dream that was taking place and to place the tile among the stones above the front door.
The metal plate – with a drawing of a phoenix rising from its ashes – belong to an old insurance company that, in the mid 1800’s, applied these plates on houses that it ensured, as a possible deterrent to arson.

At the beginning of the 20th century, in this same house, Ms. Maria (Matilde’s mother) had opened a small inn but, not having paid the customs duty for transporting wine, she got into a mulct of such a large amount that she preferred spending a month in Vergato prisons, rather than paying it.
In addition to the name, also the spirit that you can feel here, it’s remained unchanged; a hundred years before us, within these walls, grandmother Maria had believed in hospitality.

Throughout the restructuring we have respected the existing architectural diagrams keeping them as much as possible in their original condition. We preserved as much as possible all that was authentic, recovering what we could and replacing what the weather had worned down too much. This way, as well as throught the mindframe with which we live our housefarm, we think we are respecting the traditional values of our land.

This village, with its particolar atmosphere hosts within itself some bedrooms that are well suited to relaxing holidays, combined with the pleasure of living surrounded by chestnut and oak trees.
A few hundred meters away is the house in the fields – named in the old maps as “Aia Vecchia” – a completely restored and a more secluded building where the other rooms are.
A stay in our farmhouse includes, in addition to accommodation, also a large breakfast prepared with a selection of products from our production and land, as well as a restaurant offering traditional and wholesome foods; specifically we use, among other things, what comes from the farm where we breed “Mora Romagnola” pigs, “Dexter” miniature cattle and “Suffolk” sheeps.

…and how we are today

We are two brothers who manage the farm, and we share the tasks required – Paolo mainly takes care of the kitchen and the farm, while Remo focuses on welcoming the guests and on the restaurant; for both, however, versatility is primary, in treating any task that presents itself.
Around us different people allow us to make everything work, in addition to “historical” employees other people have been and will be with us, for longer or shorter periods. What unites them all is that in addition to contributing to our work, they all became friends.
Today, after more than seventy years after the marriage of Matilde and Arturo time has brought other children who, though still small, are already trying to follow the family footsteps, fascinated by everything about the farm that for them, at the time, it is just a big playground.