We believe that the best way to preserve a historic building is to give it a purpose. Not to freeze it in time, but to bring it into the present as a place where people sleep, eat, meet, and belong. Hospitality and culture are not in conflict with heritage. They are what sustains it.
We believe in slow travel. In staying longer, spending locally, and leaving a place better than you found it. In the idea that the interior of Italy — its villages, its landscapes, its forgotten estates — has as much to offer as its famous cities, if given the chance.
And we believe in partnership. Nothing we are building in Alvisopoli can work without the farmers, craftspeople, institutions, and neighbours who make this corner of Veneto what it is. We are not arriving with answers. We are here to build something together.
About
What we believe
Heritage is not a museum piece. It is a living resource — one that belongs to the communities around it, and that thrives when people are given a reason to engage
with it.
Our first project is here, in Alvisopoli. In the barchesse of Villa Mocenigo, an 18th-century estate built as an ideal city.
Join
Work with us
We are looking for partners who share a love for this land and what it stands for.
Local food and wine producers, craftspeople, construction companies, businesses, cultural organisations, universities, and foundations — anyone who wants to help shape what Alvisopoli becomes.
Partnership with a&o cultura e storia means more than a logo on a wall. It means a seat at the table, a voice in the project, and a connection to a growing network of people working at the intersection of heritage, hospitality, and community.
The estate was built in the early 19th century by Count Alvise Mocenigo as an ideal city — a self-sufficient community combining agriculture, education, culture, and social life under one roof. It is one of the most remarkable and least known estates in the Veneto.
The barchesse, two symmetrical colonnaded wings flanking the main villa, are being restored into the Hostelleria di Alvisopoli: a cultural guest house with eight rooms, a restaurant rooted in local Veneto cuisine, a bakery and pastry laboratory, and a public bar open to guests and locals alike.
Every intervention is fully reversible. We are working within the constraints of the Italian Cultural Heritage Code, using dry construction methods and recycled materials. The building comes first. Our job is to make it liveable without making it lesser.
Alvisopoli is the prototype. Our ambition is to replicate this model across Italy, one historic villa at a time.
About
The project
Our first home is the barchesse of Villa Mocenigo in Alvisopoli, a small hamlet in the province of Venice.