Tuscan Paradise
For Sting and Trudie Styler, landscape designer Arabella Lennox-Boyd plants a heavenly garden near Florence
Text by Mitchell Owens/Photography by Giancarlo Gardin
Portrait by Jaime Travezan
Published January 2011
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At Villa Palagio, Sting and Trudie Styler’s farm in Tuscany, a terrace offers views of the couple’s biodynamic vineyards and the Chianti hills beyond; the landscape design is by Arabella Lennox-Boyd.
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The musician and his wife bought the property in 1997.
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The 16th-century villa was built as a hunting lodge for the dukes of San Clemente.
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Chinese wisteria cloaks the 118-foot-long oak pergola.
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An antique marble fountain rises out of the boxwood parterre.
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Clipped boxwood frames beds of lavender, santolina, and white oleander.
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An ancient cedar of Lebanon overlooks the parterre, formally known as Il Giardino dei Limoni, or garden of the lemon trees.
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Sting came up with the idea for the oversize chessboard.
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Lunch is often served on a gravel terrace in the shade of an oak tree.
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The pool, installed by a previous owner, overlooks the Valdarno Superiore valley.
architecturaldigest.com