A house of 1631 that has been a hotel since 2019.
Two people who had never run a hotel bought it in 2016 and spent 27 months on it. Some of what follows is what we are proud of and some of it is what we cannot fix.
Breakfast opens. One table for fourteen, one seating, no buffet.
Breakfast closes and the table becomes the place people work at.
Rooms are stripped. Two housekeepers, eleven rooms, four hours.
Check-in. Earlier if the room is ready; we will not promise it in advance.
The bar opens. Everything on it is made within 60 km of the door.
The bar closes. The front door is on a code after this and there is always someone up.
One table of fourteen, 07:30 to 10:00, everything brought to it.
- Bread from a forno on Via Petroni, delivered at 06:40
- Eggs cooked to order, because the alternative is eggs going cold in a tray
- Parmigiano Reggiano 30 months, Mora Romagnola prosciutto, one soft cheese that changes
- Whatever fruit was good at Mercato delle Erbe on Tuesday
- Coffee made on the machine at the bar, not a push-button one
No buffet. A buffet for eleven rooms means throwing away about a third of it every morning, and we would rather cook eggs. A tray in your room is EUR 8 and we would honestly rather you came down.
Nothing on it is made more than 60 km from the door.
Three sides of the building, three different nights.
Onto the cortile: four walls, a well head and a fig tree that should have been cut down in 2011. The quietest rooms in the building and the ones that never get sun.
The back of the house, over the covered Canale delle Moline. You cannot see the canal — nobody can, it runs under the street — you are looking at the rear walls of Via Piella.
Onto Via delle Moline. One-way, inside the ZTL, so it is vans until ten and then almost nothing — but it is a street, and it sounds like one.
Refuse lorry, Via delle Moline. Two minutes, and it is the loudest thing that happens all day.
Bread and produce vans for the Quadrilatero start their run.
The same vans, heard from the back of the house — 42 dB(A), which is the loudest the canal side ever gets and still quieter than the street side at midnight.
Our own kitchen extractor, 07:00 to 10:30. We have not found a quieter one that fits the flue.
October only: the sluice gates are opened for the autumn flush and the water is loud for about a week.
Last of the bars on Via Piella turning out. Voices, not music.
The list a hotel is not supposed to publish.
No room here has a canal view
The Canale delle Moline runs under the street. It was covered in 1954 and the only place you can see it is the finestrella on Via Piella, 190 m from our door, along with everyone else's phone. Rooms on the canal side look at the backs of the houses on Via Piella. That is the truth and it is still a nice thing to wake up to.
One night, on a Friday or Saturday, between 10 September and 20 October — no
Fair season. Eleven rooms cannot absorb a one-night Saturday: it costs us the Friday and the Sunday too. Two nights minimum in that window. Every other week of the year, one night is fine.
We do not promise early check-in
Two housekeepers clean eleven rooms between eleven and three. If a room is ready at midday you will have it at midday. If we promised it in advance we would be promising you someone else's rushed room.
No parties of more than four rooms
Not a moral position. Five rooms is half the house, and the other half booked a quiet hotel.
Dogs up to 12 kg, and not in 301, 302 or 303
Seventy-two steps and a 2.10 m eaves line. We charge nothing for the dog and we will not carry it.
We are not fully accessible and we will not imply that we are
Three steps at the street door with no ramp. The 2019 lift car is 100 × 120 cm with an 80 cm door, which works for a walking frame and not for most wheelchairs. Room 103's bathroom door is 68 cm. We could not widen it inside a protected structure and we have not found another answer. If step-free matters, write to us and we will tell you honestly whether to book somewhere else — we have done that about thirty times and we would rather do it again than take the money.