This is my most treasured Sanctuary Room, in my Italian Arthouse - which I bought for a song 11 years ago, when the medieval quarter was almost totally abandoned...
And this is what it looked like when I first viewed the house! Bare concrete, no retaining wall over the steps, a tattered paper ceiling, lots of old furniture, etc... It looks twice the size of what it was!
This room is at the very core of the building - in under the earth, and directly touching the rocks at the back walls... which makes it quite organic and natural - i.e. movement of humidity. It takes a bit of maintenance with a dehumidifier.
But its positioning also makes it incredibly cosy, quiet, peaceful - which makes a perfect guest room and meditation space. I also record my podcasts here. It feels like a blessed space, safe and secure, so still...
There used to be a niche at the very back of the room, but I filled it in, and have a defined arch and seat there now.
The painting in this photo is on the wall that I built where the niche used to be. You can see in the foreground also, the small wall and wooden 'side-table' that I built, to avoid walking off the platform floor and down the stairs! This is what that looked like before:
And now - looking down the steps:
And from below this room, the central cantina/ cellar - looking up to the Sanctuary...
The ceiling had to get stripped back to its bare raggedy bones, and re-papered first, then I recently covered it with white sheets, which lowers the ceiling (as it covers up the spaces between the travi/ beams) but softens the whole room and gives it a whole other look:
I'm particularly proud of this room, as I have additionally not just had to slog away at the very laborious tasks of cementing, building walls, constructing a futon bed out of bare wood, painting and stucco-ing - but this room has been completely ruined 4 times, by ignorant neighbours above doing construction work and having massive leaky pipe issues.
This final time, have written extensively to my absentee owners of the above property, quoting trespass and Rights and Natural Law... I finally broke open the wall, took out a section of their down-tube - our houses (used to!) share plumbing -and blocked the upper pipe. Though, if they visit again, they technically can switch their water on and create a leak again and damage my home, but it will also back-up into their expensively renovated apartment, which is at least a bit of karma corrected.
Having made the immense efforts of re-fabricking the ceiling, plastering and painting three walls, re-painting the floor, cleaning an expensive painting which the leak dripped down, taking the wall and pipe apart and rebuilding the wall, and wasting a LOT of hours writing lengthy emails,
I am exquisitely pleased to have everything in order again - it's fixed-up by my own hands, with often with literally zero budget - but this makes it, at least in my eyes, all the more beautiful.
Now I can lay down and enjoy the silence, record my podcasts whilst appreciating the clean space, and invite friends and family to visit again!
Blessings on my home! Thanks for reading!
