A Bit of History
Agriturismo S.Angelo is a country house in Tuscany that has been run by Giuliano Illuminati's family for decades. It consists of a beautiful farmhouse divided into 11 apartments, a panoramic restaurant and immense fields of orchards and olive trees.
Our territory in Valdichiana is a land rich in history and characterized by historic changes. In the ancient times it was a marshland and it was drained under the reign of the Medicis and the Lorena family, reaching its highest period of glory with Grand duke Leopoldo II in the 19th century. As a mark of this magnificent time you can still see the famous country houses called "leopoldine" in his honor, which are scattered all around the Tuscan countryside.
The farmhouse was originally a monastery dating back to the 16th century, then used by farmers as houses and stables in the following centuries and finally left abandoned and in a state of ruin. The Illuminati's family purchased the estate around the 1970s in order to start a farm in Foiano della Chiana and cultivate fields of orchard for fruit production in Arezzo. The Illuminati's farm produces different types of apples (Golden, Stark, Stayman) and of pears (decana, william), as well as peaches and plums, which can be bought directly on the farm itself.
In 2000 the family decided to improve a large part of the estate, by renovating the house and the outbuildings into refined apartments for holiday rental and by converting stables and sheds into an elegant restaurant with a view onto Cortona. The five-year-long renovation works have been finicky to keep the nature of the place unchanged and make the wonderful Tuscan-style country house that you can see today. All the apartments and the common areas have been renovated with taste by preserving the original structures (bricks, roofing tiles, wooden beams), by combining tradition with modern conveniences and by paying attention to details in order to create a place without architectural barriers to be even accessible to disabled people. Agriturismo S.Angelo will offer you the right accommodation for any kind of needs so that you will spend an unforgettable vacation in Cortona.
