The history of the village
The story of a village's renaissance in the rural soul of Molise
Borgotufi is a modern fairy tale, in which the history of a village was redesigned and the life of a town was reborn. Once upon a time in Castel del Giudice there was a place immersed in the Apennine nature called "Tufi", with the colour of ochre stone. A place of ancient rurality, it included stables, stone barns and agricultural sheds, the pastoral soul of an area crossed by drove roads.
Starting in the 1950s, emigration drove shepherds and farmers away from the town, until just there was just one horse remaining to occupy the only inhabited stable in the 1990s. Rejecting the idea of abandonment, in the early 2000s, three local entrepreneurs, animated by their emotional bond with their land and the determination to give it a new future, became involved in an ambitious redevelopment project through the mayor of the Municipality of Castel del Giudice, Lino Gentile, and began to work on the transformation. Enrico and Gianfranco Ricci, owners of Ricci Guido srl, took on the risk of handling the architectural restoration of the village. With them was Ermanno D’Andrea, a native of Capracotta (IS) and owner of D’Andrea SPA. A convinced supporter of the economic rebirth of Castel del Giudice, he had already created a branch of his large company in the town in Alto Molise. So it was that two important local companies came to the front lines to save a village. United with the Municipality in a society for urban transformation, they gave life to a new destiny.
It was precisely at this moment that the fairy tale was fulfilled and, with it, the vision of making the old stables into the houses of a multi-building hotel, an authentic village with the mantra of hospitality and experiential tourism, with high-level services and architecture that preserves the purest identity of the place and the landscape. The Ricci brothers called local workers and chose local materials, such as Agnone stone and wood, to give rise to what has become a dream for visitors from all over the world. They created a partially underground building with broad views of the woods and the peaks, a panoramic terrace, the lower part of which houses the reception and the restaurant, with full-wall windows that take in the landscape, and a wellness centre with swimming pool on the lower floor, which reflects the trees and mountains.
Around the piazza and further up, among the alleys named after the ancient apples that are produced in Castel del Giudice, the 36 houses of the village feature rooms and suites. Their interior furnishings have been carefully designed by Rosanna Donatelli, who hand-crafted the embroidered curtains of the wooden windows, staying in total harmony with the village's origins. The houses, with a historic and refined atmosphere, open onto evocative views and gardens with aromatic herbs, flowers and rose beds. Inside, they reveal walls with exposed stone, iron elements, romantic fireplaces and ceilings with wooden beams. Others amaze with their modern design, in a continuous dialogue between history, art and contemporaneity. This harmony is also found in the village piazza, a venue for events and ceremonies dominated by the artwork "La Fanciulla del Borgo". From the piazza you can admire some glimpses of the Melise organic apple tree, another success story by the Municipality, Ermanno D’Andrea and the Ricci brothers, who recovered some disused land in the name of sustainable agriculture. Two panoramic conference rooms make Borgotufi a reference point for national and international events.
The gastronomic proposal is the work of two restaurants, which draw the lifeblood of their dishes from the first fruits of the Borgotufi vegetable garden. Led by Gianluca Bellano, a young chef from Abruzzo, Ristorante del Borgo reworks traditional Abruzzo and Molise cuisine based on his grandmother's dishes and selected ingredients. The gourmet MIA restaurant is found on the panoramic piazza and is run by Chef Marco Pasquarelli, a pupil of Niko Romito, for new explorations of taste. At Borgotufi, each stone tells a story of rebirth and innovation. The fairy tale of this special village continues...
la Fanciulla del borgo
For several years now, Borgotufi panoramic piazza has been home to "La Fanciulla", a work by the Abruzzo artist Franco Summa that gives light and shapes to the village.
A female figure with vivid colours. A young girl, a tapered icon of an ideal femininity that I imagine almost as a primordial goddess, a guardian and mother of the expansive earth that dominates from that balcony. Franco Summa
