Italy, here I come!

Set on Giudecca Island, this 379-room hotel is welcoming and spacious — a calm anchoring point just 15 minutes from St. Mark’s Square via the hotel’s shuttle boat. 

This glamorous hotel is easily the splashiest new opening in Rome, a city full of splashy new hotels. It’s also a homecoming for Bulgari, the jewelry-turned-hospitality brand born in Rome in 1884.

In the Papi family for eight generations and now led by a mother and son team, La Corte dei Papi is rooted in Tuscany’s agrarian history but with a modern refresh.

As I look out from the terrace of a small house in Moltrasio on Lake Como I can hear the thwack of tennis balls on the court below me, and half hope that George Clooney will be playing a set with his beloved, since locals have told me he played there (once, five years ago.) No such luck.