Camilla’s dream of saving childhood villa
The paint is now peeling from the walls and the iron gates are rusting.
But the glory of the honey-stoned Italian villa where the Duchess of Cornwall once played as a child still shines through – and she hopes to eventually buy it back for her own grandchildren.
Speaking to the Daily Mail in Florence yesterday, on the second day of an official tour of Italy, Camilla revealed that she had always rued the day her mother sold the beautiful family villa, first bought by her great-grandmother Alice Keppel, mistress of King edward VII.
‘It’s in private hands but is all boarded up,’ she said. ‘It’s such a tragedy. I feel like I should start a campaign to buy it back up. It was a magnificent place.’
Set on a hill above the Arno river in Florence, Villa dell’Ombrellino – roughly translated as Villa Parasol – was bought by socialite Mrs Keppel with the fortune she accrued as the lover of Prince Charles’s great-great-grandfather. The affair lasted until his death in 1910.
In 1925, she and her husband George moved to Italy where they bought Villa dell’Ombrellino. Its origins date back to 1372, and it was once home to the scientist Galileo and the poet Foscolo.
Camilla, whose sister Annabel studied art in Florence, said she remembered playing as a child in the villa’s glorious gardens which were filled with statues.
It was eventually sold by her mother Rosalind Shand, whose mother Sonia was Mrs Keppel’s younger daughter.