When you grow up in Como, steps from the majestic Italian lake and with a backdrop of snow-capped mountains, how would it be possible to live anywhere else? Valentina De Santis, who spent her childhood here, will tell you that it would be very hard indeed. So much so, she lives in the striking lakeside house where she spent her teenage years, together with her parents.
“It’s difficult to find a place that’s as beautiful as this,” says De Santis. “It is dear to my heart.” Standing on the lake’s edge, the home has the kind of views of the surrounding mountains that draw an intake of breath; there are also glimpses of the town and the cathedral’s distinctive green dome. “It is a Roman town enclosed in ancient walls. In the city centre, houses don’t have gardens,” she says. It’s not a luxury she is missing here.
The third-generation hotelier did spend several years at university in Milan, before joining consulting firm Bain & Company, where she focused on fashion and luxury for four years. But it was a blip. Though she “wanted to create my own path”, she soon returned to Como.
Since 1975, De Santis’s family has owned the Grand Hotel Tremezzo, the landmark 1910 property set on the lake. As a child, she would often decamp there for the summer. Even then, she had a sense that her path would lead her back to the family business. “I always knew,” she says. “When I was at primary school and I had to write down how I envisioned my day as an adult, I imagined myself like my grandfather [who bought the property] in his office.”
When the hotel celebrated its centenary in 2010, De Santis’s parents asked her a pivotal question: would she join the family business or continue forging her own way? They wanted to invest further in the hotel, and as their only child, it made sense that she would be the one to spearhead the plans.
In 2012, she moved back to Como and went all in. In 2016, after taking on roles in sales and marketing, she became CEO. Two years later, she and her parents expanded the portfolio by buying an 18th-century villa and transforming it into the Villa Passalacqua; it opened in 2022 and a year later won Best Hotel in Europe and the World’s Best Hotel.
De Santis was, in more ways than one, born for hospitality. Warm, approachable and gracious, she is quick to laugh and has a gift for making people feel at ease. As an only child, maintaining close ties to her parents is important; her son, Paolo, is named after her father and her daughter, Maria, after her grandmother.
Behind an ornate iron gate, the pale yellow house where the family lives, built in 1785 by Count Giuseppe Resta atop the ruins of an ancient monastery, stands in manicured grounds; the lawn, facing the lake, features an installation by Richard Long — just one of many monumental contemporary artworks that create an intriguing contrast with the historic buildings. Pedimental sculptures are carved into the building’s facade; gargoyles lurk beneath the pitched rooftop.
Originally, there were two separate buildings, but in the early 19th century, Italian philanthropist Count Sebastiano Mondolfo’s extensive renovations connected them with a glass-walled, stone-floored veranda. Later, during the second world war, the house was occupied first by German soldiers, and then American military. “At that time, the owners were confined to a few rooms,” says De Santis. “The soldiers damaged the villa and covered all the frescoes.”
When her family first bought the property in 1998, it was dilapidated. It took four years to renovate and one of the greatest discoveries was a series of 12 magnificent frescoes: gold roses with a checked background and trompe l’oeil stuccoes with angels. “They were all covered in cement,” she says, and “needed to be painstakingly restored”. Though parts of the frescoes were lost, rather than redoing them, they left them unfinished. “We wanted to keep the history,” she says.
For her and her husband, who oversees finance and IT operations for the hotel business, and their two children (aged seven and nine), De Santis has renovated the part that had been left untouched since her parents bought the house. “It was there waiting,” she says. The set-up with her parents is ideal, she says. “We live in the same place, but we have separate lives.”
Their own family history is now ingrained in the home: at the back is a wall of climbing Pierre de Ronsard roses. “My grandmother adored these,” De Santis says, gesturing towards the pink petals.
De Santis’s own renovations took an initial two years, followed by a further year in 2019. In some instances, clever solutions were needed to build around the frescoes; one bathroom has been created like a box — a room within a room.
The work dovetailed with that being done at Passalacqua. “We hadn’t actively been looking to buy another property,” says De Santis. But the family were always keeping an eye out for local opportunities. So when a friend told them in 2018 about a villa heading to auction, the family decided to take a look.
“We went with zero expectations,” De Santis says. But the moment she arrived, “I didn’t even need to cross the gate — I fell crazy in love”.
Situated on another side of the lake, 20km from Grand Hotel Tremezzo, Passalacqua offered an alternative prospect to the monumental property that revels in splendour and grandeur of the Belle Époque, and which has hosted everyone from Winston Churchill to Greta Garbo and George Clooney. “[Passalacqua] had a different atmosphere. It felt very intimate, almost like a private house, but [also] very historical and luxurious,” she says.
And so they designed it as they might a grand historic home. “It was fun trying to imagine how a noble family was hosting their guests back at the end of the 1700s.” To some in the industry, De Santis has become known as the Lady of the Lake.
Passalacqua and De Santis’s home share some similarities — from the frescoed ceilings to the cheerful yellow-and-white striped awnings. But while the hotel leans into its historical roots, De Santis’s personal space has a distinctive modern edge. “I love to mix and match [modern furniture] with historical pieces,” she says.
In the dining room that looks out on to the lake, a Moooi Raimond II pendant chandelier hangs above a sleek wooden table, surrounded by bold purple and hot-pink tub chairs. On the floor, a crystal lamp bought at a flea market in Paris sits near two red chinoiserie cabinets — one sourced at a bazaar and another found at the hotel. “When we bought Passalacqua, there was a little room upstairs with furniture, so I kept this,” she says, pointing to the cabinet. One of the dining room’s more unusual features is a piece of art by Richard Nonas: a big iron, glass-encased cross carved directly into the floor that stretches into the living room.
“My parents are collectors of contemporary art, so it is everywhere in the house,” she says. And outside. De Santis jokes that when many of her friends see Long’s collection of rocks strung across the terrace in a long line, they “think that workers left some pieces of stone out”. But the artwork holds a lot of meaning for her. “It’s [this feeling of] back and forth,” she says. “It’s creating this ongoing link between the two houses and between me and my parents.”
Having spent much of her childhood at the Grand Hotel Tremezzo, De Santis has developed a deep appreciation for the nuances of hospitality. “I always loved the details and the feeling of being in a hotel,” she says, noting that she grew up aware of “what details make it special”. Whether designing her own residence or creating spaces for guests, she approaches each project “in the pursuit of beauty”.
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