Manor of Cappelletti
On the important Colle Plinio was built villa Cappelletti, a neoclassical building of the seventeenth century, surrounded by a large garden. The villa is located on the top of the hill Pliny, about a mile from the village of Lama, near the resort town of San Giustino, a short distance from Tuscany.
This closeness has resulted in the territory of the High Tiber, more than in other areas of Umbria, the influence of Tuscany for what concerns the architectural lines of the villas of the Renaissance period. In fact, in these constructions are found common elements, such as the cypress, the park, the lake, the water features, designed to stand out from simple farmhouses.
The building is shaped in an articulated way, even if they are still detectable the two phases that have determined the shape. The area at the back is certainly the oldest and is made of stone, while the expansion in 1905 is located in the current portion of a building brick-face view. The villa is spread over three floors punctuated by a frame of pilasters and string courses that wraps around the main volume, in which you open the windows of the second floor, the first floor balconies and entrances on the ground floor, where they are organized stables. On the main facade there are four niches symmetrically arranged on the ground floor and the first, they would have to accommodate statues representing the four seasons. On the rear there is a double staircase connecting with the garden. Inside the building, it retains a coat of arms of the first owners, Bourbon del Monte, depicting a lily barred, to witness an illegitimate branch. The outdoor space is arranged partly garden and partly woodland. The original garden was planted to a design inspired by that of Villa d'Este, but in the second half of the twentieth century, the changes that were made, among other interventions, foresaw the elimination of the Italian garden in front of the villa, to be able to create one with lawn. In the remaining space for a garden, were placed several artistic elements and three fountains capable of activating water features are very striking.
The large park is rich in vegetation, preserved specimens of remarkable trees, including some cedars of Lebanon and a pleasant grove of bamboo. In the vast space three artificial lakes were created by diverting the course of streams Lama and Ram, and the largest of these, about 42,000 square meters, is still used for irrigation. The two smaller lakes, where water features are possible, they are used to power a hydroelectric power plant of the villa, installed by his grandfather and father of the current owner still around when you used the oil lamps.
In the space of villa are spread service buildings, such as limonaia, greenhouse, garage and shed for tools.
The entrance is through an iron gate, placed between two stone pillars, which opens laterally to the villa, along the boundary wall about three meters high and decorated by bows.
The oldest data about the existence of the villa date back to the Gregorian Cadastre, 1835 where the villa is well recognized both in volume then the adjoining garden.
The property has been of the Bourbon del Monte until the mid-nineteenth century, when it became the property Benedict Cappelletti, having married a Bourbon del Monte. The current owners, the Marquis Cappelletti, use the villa as a temporary dwelling, being resident in Rome, and agricultural activities are handled by the factor that lives in a house outside the villa.