Villa La Pietra is a villa outside Florence, Italy in Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

. The villa and its 57 acre (23 ha) estate is now owned by New York University

New York University

New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...

, after it was bequeathed by Sir Harold Acton

Harold Acton

Sir Harold Mario Mitchell Acton CBE was a British writer, scholar and dilettante perhaps most famous for being wrongly believed to have inspired the character of "Anthony Blanche" in Evelyn Waugh's novel Brideshead Revisited...

.

The villa houses an eclectic collection of art from all around the world. A long cypress avenue connects the entrance of the estate to the house itself. The garden contains a large collection of statues Arthur Acton collected, many by Orazio Marinali

Orazio Marinali

Orazio Marinali was an Italian late-baroque sculptor, active mainly in the Veneto or Venetian mainland.He trained with Josse de Corte. He is best known for over 150 statues produced by him and his studio for the estate and gardens of a single villa in Vicenza, the Villa Lampertico...

 from Vicenza and Antonio Bonazza

Antonio Bonazza

Antonio Bonazza was an Italian sculptor of the Rococo.Antonio was the son of Giovanni Bonazza, a prominent sculptor active in Padua , and member of a large family of sculptors. He may have been influenced by Orazio Marinali of Vicenza...

 from Padua.

History

The original villa was built in the fifteenth century by the Macinghi family. It is named after a milestone which used to mark its distance from Florence. It was bought in 1460 by the Florentine banker Francesco Sassetti

Francesco Sassetti

Francesco Sassetti was an Italian banker.-Biography:He was born in Florence, the youngest son of Tommaso Sassetti. He is first recorded as joining the famous Medici bank in either 1438 or 1439 as a factor to the Avignon branch, employed by Cosimo de' Medici...

. It was bought in 1491 by the Capponi family. Cardinal Luigi Capponi

Luigi Capponi

Luigi Capponi was an Italian Catholic Cardinal who became Archbishop of Ravenna.-Biography:Capponi was born in 1582, the son of Senator Francesco Capponi and Ludovica Macchiavelli. The Capponi family had extensive links to Italian political circles and to senior members of the Catholic Church...

 made substantial renovations in the seventeenth century, adding the baroque

Baroque

The Baroque is a period and the style that used exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted detail to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, literature, dance, and music...

 exterior, thought to be designed by Carlo Fontana

Carlo Fontana

Carlo Fontana was an Italian architect, who was in part responsible for the classicizing direction taken by Late Baroque Roman architecture.-Biography:...

.

The gardens were entirely redesigned when it was landscaped in the 'English style' in the nineteenth century. The villa was bought in 1908 by Arthur Acton and his wife Hortense, the parents of Harold Acton

Harold Acton

Sir Harold Mario Mitchell Acton CBE was a British writer, scholar and dilettante perhaps most famous for being wrongly believed to have inspired the character of "Anthony Blanche" in Evelyn Waugh's novel Brideshead Revisited...

. They recreated a garden in the original Italian Renaissance style, a task continued by Harold.

When Harold Acton died in 1994, he left the estate and its art to New York University

New York University

New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...

. Acton was first inspired to leave his home as a legacy for education by Bernard Berenson

Bernard Berenson

Bernard Berenson was an American art historian specializing in the Renaissance. He was a major figure in pioneering art attribution and therefore establishing the market for paintings by the "Old Masters".-Personal life:...

.
Today students from all over the world come to the villa to live and study as they participate in New York University's study abroad program. The other buildings on the property are used for lodging and classroom space.