Tag Archives: holiday apartments

A green roof at Casa Carotondo, Le Marche

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The green roof of apartment Priora at Casa Carotondo in Le Marche, Italy

The green roof of apartment Priora at Casa Carotondo

Green roofs have been around for some time, but are now increasingly being regarded as a way to improve the environment in cities. The city of Chicago, for instance, has now declared that it sees green roofs as the way forward to try to reduce rising temperatures in the city as well as enhancing air quality. Heat is stored in the roof and walls of buildings during the day and given off at night, the so-called Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect. A green roof prevents this heat storage happening. Through the daily dew and evaporation cycle, plants on vertical and horizontal surfaces are able to cool cities during hot summer months. They also provide some insulation to the building below, even in winter. Continue reading →

Renovating a house in Le Marche, Italy – a personal account.

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I shall start with a disclaimer. We rent holiday apartments, we do not offer estate agency or renovation services. However we did renovate/are still renovating our own house and can therefore provide some insight into the process. The aim is not to discourage or spur you on, simply, to give you an account of our experience. I should also add that we did not come here specifically to start a renovation project. One of my conditions on buying the house was that we get the builders in to do at least the heavy duty work. However we started with a laughably small budget for a house of 400 sqm. Hindsight is a wonderful thing and it would have been better to employ builders to do, at least, the basics despite the expense. Instead we have kept the costs down but the whole project has taken a long time and we still haven’t finished. I would also like to reassure prospective guests that building work only takes place in the winter! Continue reading →

Why we moved to Casa Carotondo in Le Marche, Italy

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Casa Carotondo in Le Marche, Italy in2004 before we started renovating it.

Casa Carotondo in 2004 before we started renovating it.

I am often asked by guests why we came here. Was it always our dream to set up home in Italy and live la dolce vita? The answer in our case is a simple: No. We were living in London and had both given up the jobs as goldsmith (Rob) and software consultant (Vanessa) we had been doing for too long. We were fed up with routine and were looking for an adventure and a new challenge. We had done a couple of house renovations. I was fed up with house renovation, Rob wanted something a little more demanding. I wanted a large garden with a vegetable plot. We enjoy walking and cycling so the idea of living close to mountains was enticing; both of us had wasted many hours in traffic jams travelling from London to various hilly hotspots in Great Britain only to be greeted by a deluge of water falling from the heavens. Of course living in a warmer climate is in itself a bonus compounded by the availability of products from that climate such as wine and olives and the added interest of a foreign culture and language. It was a friend who put the idea of Italy in our heads.

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