Like your homes to be historic, yet still boast 21st-century amenities? Like your architecture classical, belying extraordinary interiors worthy of glossy design magazines? Well, then you’ll love Hortus. Each handsome room here marries original, vernacular details with luxuries, chic touches and decor from the owner’s travels. Look out for a small, hi-tech gym below wonky wood beams, and thought-provoking modern paintings lining both dining rooms’ plaster walls. Perhaps most memorable is the smaller lounge, thanks to tubular art installations and shelves dense with colourful books.

Outside, manicured gardens envelop the villa. Within them you’ll find a long, lawn-framed swimming pool plus benches hidden in woodland – ideal for reading or meditating. On Hortus’s main terrace, under a vine-festooned pergola, is a dinner table gloriously overlooking olive groves and green hills – the type of view that you immediately want to sketch or snap.

Visible from other spots are Siena’s medieval domes; the city and its bi-annual Palio horse race is just ten minutes away. Also nearby are pretty walled hilltowns, such as San Gimignano, plus the Val d’Orcia’s famous vineyards and endless walking routes past sunflower fields. Return for a barbecue and then relish the rainfall showers in each spacious bedroom’s ensuite. One of the five bedrooms can become a twin for children or friends; another has a freestanding bathtub and the biggest enjoys a private annex with its own lounge.