The Renovation of il Ritiro

🏗️ The Renovation of il Ritiro – Could It Really Be Done in 90 Days?

Finalising the purchase of our little slice of Italy had its challenges. But in truth, that was the easy part.

The real question was this: how do you fully renovate a three-storey house you've never inspected, in a village where you know no one, when you don't speak a word of the local language beyond "biro" and while working around visa restrictions that only allow you to stay 90 days at a time before you must leave for another 90?

When we first bought il Ritiro, the plan was sensible. We would sign the deed using a Power of Attorney, then arrive a couple of months later to assess the property properly. We'd evaluate its condition, finalise renovation plans, source materials, meet local trades, lodge any necessary applications with the Comune, and calmly bring it all together.

It sounded organised. Practical.

We already had a summer trip planned to Italy and Europe. A deeply personal weekend in London had been locked in — we were taking the ashes of my parents and my aunt to scatter beneath a family tree on Hampstead Heath. That date wasn't moving. Everything else had to work around it.

We thought we could neatly splice the early renovation planning into that existing itinerary.

Then as usual, everything shifted.

One day Ainslie casually said, "You could maybe go a bit earlier and see what you can get done?"

Why not? I could leave two months earlier than planned, attend the deed signing in person, and at least begin the clean-up.

But then a small, persistent thought began to grow.

What if I could actually do it in 90 days?

What if I could make il Ritiro liveable before Ainslie arrived, in 60 days?

What if this wild idea was maybe just possible?

You guessed it, the seed was planted. I booked the early flight and started planning for the impossible.

🚪 Day One: Reality Arrives

On the first day onsite, the magnitude of what I'd taken on began to sink in.

From the street, the house looked… fine. Tired, but fine.

Then I pushed open the tall metal gates.

Weeds — thick, tangled and shoulder-high — blocked the path to the front door. Inside was even more confronting. Every room was filled. Not cluttered — filled. Decades of belongings covered virtually every inch of floor space, often stacked high enough to brush the ceilings. Plaster peeled from walls. The bathroom was, generously speaking, a wreck.

It was daunting.

So I remembered the old saying: how do you eat an elephant?

One small bite at a time.

And I started.

🌿 Clearing the Jungle

Step one was obvious. The yard had to be cleared so I could empty the house and begin the renovations.

I had initially imagined doing most of it myself. That illusion lasted about 5 minutes.

What I needed was a small team. With equipment. And a truck.

So I walked to the local Stampa — the village shop — and, via Google Translate, asked the owner if he knew a gardener. His answer was simple: "Fubine."

Fubine, it turned out, was the next village over.

"Where in Fubine?" I asked.

"The bar."

So I drove ten minutes to Fubine, saw a sign that said "Bar," pulled over, walked in, held up my phone and asked (again through Google Translate) if anyone was a gardener.

Within minutes I was talking to Ken.

He came to look at the property that afternoon. We walked the grounds, agreed on a price, shook hands. It was 3pm. He said he and his team would be there the next morning.

And they were.

By 9am the following day, three men were working flat-out. Within a day, the jungle was gone. The yard was stripped back. The truck had made multiple runs piled high with weeds and cuttings. For the first time, I could actually see the ground.

More importantly, we now had space to begin clearing the house.

At the end of the day, as I was exchanging pleasantries and thanking the team for their hard work, they asked me my age. I'd been working like a man possessed all day, setting the pace and keeping the energy up, and I think it genuinely impressed them. When I told them how old I was, their reactions ranged from wide-eyed surprise to outright admiration — a small moment, but one that reminded me how much teamwork and determination make even the toughest days' work out OK.

🏠 A House Full of History

The interior was a different kind of challenge.

Four beds. Wardrobes. Cabinets. Mountains of clothes. Kitchenware. Boxes of bric-a-brac. A lifetime of mementos. It was clear the extended family had simply closed the door and walked away, leaving everything as it was when the owner passed.

Having recently helped clear a family estate of my own, I understood how emotionally difficult that process can be. Every object carries memory. Every discarded item can feel like betrayal.

In this house, I had no personal connection to the former owners — yet there was still something sobering about dismantling someone else's life.

I did save a few things: two framed artworks, photographs of the last two generations of the family, and a beautiful collection of classic Italian blue crockery tucked carefully into a cupboard in the kitchen.

The cellar was a small treasure trove. The previous owner had been part of the local wine co-operative. There were two oak barrels, nine demijohns, winemaking equipment, and a couple of old panieri — the timber backpacks used to carry grapes during harvest. There were also dozens of bottles of wine dating back up to 40 years.

Time will tell whether any of them survived to be drinkable.

It took nearly three full days to clear the house completely. Everything was sorted, salvaged, smashed and then loaded onto the truck bound for the local tip.

Only then could the real renovation begin. But luck was still on my side. Ken casually mentioned that he's not actually a gardener but a builder, did I want him to help me do the renovations ? I most certainly did !

By this time we'd built a good rapport, I gave Ken a copy of the scope of works, we agreed a price, and the work started straight away.

🧱 Stripping Back to Start Again

With the rooms finally empty, the next task was less sentimental and more brutal: removing loose plaster, flaking paint, broken tiles, outdated wiring and crumbling fixtures.

It was messy. Dusty. Physical.

But for the first time, il Ritiro felt like possibility instead of problem.

The question remained:

Could it really be done in 90 days?

At that point, I still didn't know.

But the elephant was getting smaller.

🔨 Stripping Back to Stone – Rebuilding il Ritiro

Once the house was empty, there was nowhere left for the problems to hide.

The old stone walls were coated internally with a lime-based render. On first glance it looked serviceable. On closer inspection, it wasn't. Cracks ran through most walls, large sections were loose, and decades of damp had crept in from places long forgotten.

There was only one option.

Strip most of it off.

It was hot, dusty and relentless work. Every loose section had to be chipped away by hand. There were no shortcuts here — just hours of hammering, scraping and sweeping.

Thankfully, the ceilings were structurally sound. The Volta Catalana (Catalan Vault) construction had held up beautifully over the years. The work there was mostly cosmetic: stripping old paint from slightly rusted steel I-beams, scraping away cracked lime wash, and removing the maze of outdated electrical wiring that had been added over the decades.

The old kitchen and bathroom were another story. Every wall tile had to come off — along with the cement backing behind them. Ironically, they had been installed exceptionally well. What might have been a quick demolition job turned into painstaking chiselling, inch by inch, that took days.

And this was all being done the old-school way.

There was no power at this stage. No fancy tools. Just hand chisels, hammers, and a makeshift paint scraper I'd fashioned by attaching a blade to the end of a broom handle. Most of my equipment came from the cellar or from a quick trip to Brico.

Within about a week — blisters and all — the strip-out was complete. And, in a small but significant victory, the local electric company connected the mains. For the first time, we could run a power board.

Il Ritiro welcomes the 21st century.

🔨 Progress, Finally

I took a short trip to Germany to visit my son Ben and left Ken's crew to begin patching the walls. Every room required significant repairs, and one stairwell had been completely stripped back to stone, so there was no shortage of work.

When I returned, I was genuinely surprised. The internal walls were rendered and ceiling patches were finished. The place was starting to resemble a home again.

Next came one of the more strategic decisions.

Between the kitchen level and the sitting room above, there was an internal wall supporting part of the staircase. By removing roughly a metre of that wall and installing a steel support, we were able to dramatically improve the kitchen layout. Even better, it created space beneath the stairs for a compact laundry.

A small structural change. A big practical improvement.

Steel support installed. Render patched. Onwards and upwards.

⚡The Electrical Reality Check

Early in the project, I made a time-saving decision.

Rather than chase electrical wiring into the rendered walls — a messy and slow process — I opted for the traditional Italian approach of running wiring externally on porcelain supports. It suited the character of the house and would save valuable days.

What I hadn't checked was the price of the cable required.

Or how difficult it would be to source in quantity.

The electrical materials alone ended up costing more than €4,000 — far more than expected. And there were frustrating delays in getting supply. But by then I was committed.

While the rendering team worked inside, I turned my attention to the windows and shutters.

🪟 Restoring the Details

I removed all the windows and shutters and gave them to Gianfranco, my carpenter.

His brief was clear:

• Strip and prepare the window frames for repainting and reglazing
• Build four new sets of traditional Piedmontese shutters to replace those beyond saving
• Restore the front doors
• Construct a cleaner's cupboard for Level 1

The transformation once the restored shutters returned was immediate. The house began to regain its dignity.

🚿 The Bathroom Reimagined

The bathroom layout remained largely as it had been — but everything you could see or touch was new.

All water supply and waste pipes were replaced. A new floor was poured. This section of the roof was rebuilt. The walls were stripped, re-rendered and prepared for tiling.

I chose a terracotta floor tile — warm and traditional — paired with simple white wall tiles, white fittings and polished chrome fixtures. Clean, understated, contemporary… but still respectful of the building's age and style.

It felt like the right balance.

Heating for the North

Being in northern Italy, not far from the Alps, heating was not optional.

The property had previously used an oil burner — not a viable choice in 2025. The old kitchen fireplace wasn't practical either.

I was surprised at how many homes still rely on pellet heaters. As winter approached, Brico had what looked like mountains of animal feed stacked outside. They were actually pellets — fuel for heaters.

In the end, I chose three independent reverse-cycle electric air conditioning units, one per floor. They provide both heating and cooling, are relatively economical to buy & run, and allow each level to operate independently.

I could have installed a single compressor with three head units, but opted instead for three separate systems. If one fails, the others will still operate.

There is nothing worse than cold, unhappy tenants.

⏱️The Half Way Mark

At around day 45, something shifted.

The house was at lockup. The kitchen was on order. A plumber was fitting out the bathroom. The electrical installation was running behind schedule due to cable supply issues, but we had enough lights and power to operate a fridge and run the hot water system.

For the first time, I allowed myself to think:

This might actually be possible.

Ninety days no longer felt ridiculous, there were still forty days to go.

It felt… tight. But achievable.

🛋️The Final Stretch – Racing the Clock

Ainslie was due to arrive in less than two weeks.

If everything went perfectly — and that's a very big "if" in the middle of rural Italy — I might just scrape in.

Ikea was supplying almost everything that would turn il Ritiro from a building site into a home: the bed, sofa, window treatments, linen, crockery, cutlery… and of course the entire kitchen — cabinets and appliances included.

The kitchen was the linchpin. Without it, we weren't very "liveable."

I sat down with Gianfranco and we agreed he would handle the installation. He'd never installed an Ikea kitchen before, but I reassured him.

"Watch the videos," I said. "And bring your Allen key."

He laughed. We both knew it would be fine. Probably.

The Delivery Day

The Ikea delivery became its own little drama.

They arrived on the correct day — despite earlier warnings it would be delayed — but the weather chose that moment to turn theatrical. For weeks we'd had beautiful conditions. That morning the sky was almost black, low cloud hanging heavy over the village, steady rain falling in sheets.

Perfect timing.

There was a brief break in the rain just as the truck pulled up. Initially, the driver announced they would unload everything at the front door.

Everything.

There were dozens of boxes.

After a quiet conversation — and a discreet €20 note slipped to his offsider — those boxes somehow made their way upstairs to the correct rooms.

Money very well spent.

Unboxing Reality

Then came the unpacking.

And the sinking feeling.

The benchtops were the wrong finish.

One cabinet door was missing.

Crockery and cutlery were nowhere to be seen.

In a project balanced on a 90-day deadline, missing components are not small inconveniences. They are heart-rate-raising events.

Dealing with Ikea customer service was… an experience. Phone calls led nowhere. Responses non-existent. Eventually, after exhausting the normal channels, I found myself emailing the global head of customer service just to get traction.

To their credit, once it escalated, it moved.

But it was a reminder that even with a well-known global brand, you're never immune to hiccups.

The product? Excellent.

The service? Let's just say it tested the resilience I'd built over the previous 60-odd days.

And the clock was still ticking.

🎨 Limewash, Long Days and a Ceiling of Stars

The next two weeks were relentless.

Ten hours a day. Every day. Prepping. Painting. Climbing ladders. Moving drop sheets. Starting again.

All the interior surfaces were being finished in traditional limewash. I've used limewash before — it's usually a pretty relaxed, almost meditative process.

This was not that.

Two-thirds of the house was being done in blanco — pure white — and this was my first time attempting a full white limewash finish.

Here's the thing about white limewash: it goes on almost translucent. When you apply it, it barely looks like anything. You stand back and think, "Is that doing anything at all?" You have absolutely no idea what the coverage will be like until it dries.

And when you're racing a 90-day clock, waiting for paint to dry feels like torture.

In the end, it took a solid three coats to achieve the coverage I wanted. It was far more work than anticipated — but once it cured properly, it was worth every blister and late night.

The finish is extraordinary. That soft, sun-drenched white. Like linen curtains in a sea breeze. Like a small villa on a Greek island. Warm, luminous, textured — not flat and lifeless like standard paint.

Il Ritiro finally began to glow.

The Sitting Room Statement

While most of the house leaned into that relaxed Mediterranean white, the sitting room was always meant to be different.

We had built a mood board around the idea of "old-school grand." Deep green walls. Antique furniture. Subtle gold rub finishes. A room with presence.

There was just one problem.

The local limewash supplier couldn't — or wouldn't — produce a deep, saturated tint. Everything available locally was muted and earthy. Beautiful, but not dramatic.

So I widened the search.

I found a specialist company in Belgium who could produce exactly the colour I wanted. Three bags of custom-tinted lime powder were air-freighted to me in under a week.

It was not the budget option. But when the first coat went on, I knew it was the right call.

The depth of colour, the way the lime finish catches the light, the richness without gloss — it's spectacular. The room feels historic and confident, without being heavy.

A Ceiling of Stars

Around this same time — possibly fuelled by exhaustion and too much time alone with a paintbrush — I made another decision.

The sitting room ceiling still had six old wiring hooks from previous light fittings. Rather than remove them and install a conventional central pendant, I left them and instead I threaded delicate strings of pin lights between the hooks, creating a soft canopy across the vaulted ceiling.

At night, it feels like a constellation.

Not a bright chandelier. Not a statement fixture.

Just a quiet, twinkling ceiling of stars.

And in that moment — standing there late one evening, paint still drying, lights glowing softly overhead — I realised something.

This wasn't just a renovation anymore.

It was becoming a home.

✈️ Day 60 – Bringing Ainslie Home

Ainslie was due in just a couple of days.

There was no chance the kitchen would be installed in time — that battle would have to wait. But we had the essentials: a fridge, a fully functioning bathroom, lights, hot water, and enough power to feel civilised.

Most importantly, I'd managed to pull the bedroom together.

The new bed was assembled. Curtains were hung. The limewashed walls glowed softly. It wasn't finished — not even close — but it felt welcoming. Calm. Intentional.

Liveable.

Which, sixty days earlier, had felt wildly optimistic.

Milan – A Civilised Beginning

I drove to Milan to collect Ainslie from the airport.

To mark the moment properly, I'd booked us a night in the old city near the Duomo. If we were starting this new chapter in Italy, we might as well begin in style.

We spent a couple of lovely days wandering Milan — espresso in the mornings, long dinners, the quiet thrill of knowing that something entirely new was waiting for us in the countryside.

Then we retrieved the Lancia from the parking garage and headed towards Asti to collect my belongings from the rental apartment. From there, it was just a short drive to Vignale Monferrato — and to il Ritiro.

Our first night together in the house.

A Different First Impression

I'll admit, I was nervous.

My first arrival at il Ritiro had involved shoulder-high weeds, rooms stacked to the ceiling with decades of belongings, flaking plaster and a bathroom best described as "catastrophic."

Ainslie's first look was… slightly improved.

The garden had been cleared. The ornate masonry fencing had been painted. The interior was bright and fresh. The bedroom was inviting. There was hot water on demand and working lights.

We hadn't tackled the exterior painting or paving yet, and there was still plenty to do, but it was unmistakably a home.

And luckily — very luckily — Ainslie loved it as much as I did.

Standing there together that first evening, in a house that ninety days earlier had felt overwhelming, I realised something.

The question had never really been whether it could be done in 90 days.

The real question was whether we were bold enough to try.

And we were.

🍷 Our First Night – And the Corkscrew Crisis

We did, however, have one rather pressing problem.

We had a beautiful selection of excellent local wines ready for our first night at il Ritiro… but the Italians remain traditionalists. Screw caps are not part of the program.

And we had no corkscrew.

You can renovate a three-storey house in ninety days, rewire it, replaster it, limewash it, install bathrooms and air-conditioning — but forget one small piece of twisted metal and suddenly the whole operation feels fragile.

So we took a stroll up to the top piazza and visited our friend at the Stampa.

Through a mixture of broken Italian, enthusiastic gestures and shared laughter, we explained our predicament. He rummaged around the shop but couldn't find one to sell us.

Then, without hesitation, he grabbed a set of keys and motioned for us to follow.

Curious, we trailed behind him across the piazza to the village's rather elegant main local restaurant. He unlocked the door, stepped inside, disappeared briefly, and returned holding a corkscrew.

He handed it to us with a grin

There was absolutely no chance the village's newest residents were going to go without wine on their first night in town.

As it turned out, the restaurant belonged to his two daughters.

That evening, back at il Ritiro, we opened our first bottle of local Barberra as residents of Vignale Monferrato — not just with a borrowed corkscrew, but with the quiet reassurance that we had landed somewhere special.

Because sometimes it's not the renovation that makes a place feel like home.

It's the people who make sure you don't go without wine.

🏃 The Final Push – And Letting Go

After just two days of Vignale life together, Ainslie and I packed our bags and headed to Turin to catch a flight to London. We were spending two weeks with family in the UK and Ireland — a long-planned and important trip.

Leaving il Ritiro again felt different this time.

After my earlier experience of handing the reins to Ken and the team, I felt quietly confident.

As it turned out… prematurely.

When we returned, I expected to find the electrical completed, the exterior painting finished, and the kitchen installed.

Instead, the kitchen was still sitting in boxes. The electrical had barely progressed. And, to add a little drama, even the temporary power supply had been disconnected — including to the hot water heater.

It was not an auspicious homecoming.

A flurry of WhatsApp messages, a handful of urgent site meetings, and some very direct conversations later, things began moving again. But the timeline had shifted.

I now had around 30 days to complete everything and have the house ready to launch on Airbnb.

Gulp.

Thirty Days. Go.

The next few weeks were frantic.

But somehow — brick by brick, tile by tile — we got there.

• 130 square metres of pavers laid
• Exterior painting completed
• New shutters installed
• Electrical wiring finished
• Kitchen installed (minus the still-missing, mildly infuriating cabinet door)
• Interior styled with art, furniture and all the pieces that turn a house into a home

It wasn't leisurely.

But for all practical purposes, it was complete.

🛍️The Sunday Ritual

One part of the journey I haven't mentioned yet is the weekly pilgrimage to the local antique markets.

Every Sunday, a different nearby town hosts an all-day market. You can find anything — from small pieces of bric-a-brac to something as improbable as a three-metre bronze lion. It's the perfect way to spend a day, especially when punctuated by espresso and cake at one of the nearby bars.

Over those weeks I managed to assemble what I can only describe as a very satisfying haul:

• A gorgeous chaise lounge for the bedroom
• An antique desk and chair
• A marble-topped bar table with a gilt mirror above it
• A marble console table
• Side chairs with carved lion arms
• Formal salon chairs for the sitting room
• Carefully chosen artwork
• A pair of gilt-framed "instant ancestors"
• And a few beautiful pieces of crockery for the kitchen

Each piece added character. Layers. Story.

Il Ritiro began to feel curated rather than renovated.

🔑 Departure

And then, suddenly, it was my final day.

I was doing the last clean, adjusting cushions, checking light globes, walking room to room in that slightly surreal way you do when something enormous is finished.

Our first guests were due to arrive in just one week.

Ken had graciously offered to drive me to Milan airport. Lucia — our wonderful local housekeeper — had her instructions. The house was ready.

Or ready enough.

Ninety days earlier, I had walked into weeds and chaos.

Now, I was locking the door on a restored three-storey home in the hills of Piedmont, fully furnished, fully functioning, and about to welcome its first guests.

We've already booked tickets for the Formula 1 at Monza for 2026.

And we'll be back as soon as my EU passport comes through.

Because il Ritiro was never meant to be a one-season project.

It's the beginning of something much bigger..