This October, Italy On Our Radar looks at place from several perspectives.
A home in Central Italy becomes more meaningful when you understand the landscape around it. A tiny restaurant outside Bologna turns hospitality into something deeply personal. In Liguria, saving an old watermill means preserving memories as much as architecture. Elsewhere, contemporary jewelry draws on traditional techniques, wine becomes a reason to explore a region, and centuries of Italian theatrical craftsmanship travel across the Atlantic.
Not every story in this edition is about heritage. But together, they offer a reminder that experiencing Italy often begins with understanding what makes a place distinctive.
Here’s what’s on our radar this month.
Gonzaga Real Estate: Finding More Than a Home in Central Italy
Gonzaga Real Estate | Central Italy
realestategonzaga.com | Instagram: @gonzaga_real_estate
For international buyers considering a home or investment in Italy, the search can involve much more than finding the right property.
Gonzaga Real Estate specializes in farmhouses, historic residences, country estates and land in Central Italy, with particular attention to Tuscia and southern Umbria. Founder Luca Catalano Gonzaga brings an unusual perspective to the business. An international photojournalist and founder of Witness Image, he uses photography and visual storytelling to document the landscapes, villages and traditions surrounding the properties his agency represents.
The real estate remains central: helping buyers discover distinctive Italian properties and opportunities to invest. But Gonzaga’s approach also recognizes that choosing a home in Italy can mean choosing a landscape, history, community and quality of life.
His philosophy is summed up simply: “We document places before we sell homes.”
Comfort Home Restaurant: When Hospitality Begins at Home
Comfort Home Restaurant | San Giorgio di Piano, Bologna
fineforfoodie.it | Instagram: @comfort_home_restaurant
Just outside Bologna, Federico Pettazzoni and Mario Zamboni have taken the idea of Italian hospitality literally.
Comfort Home Restaurant occupies part of Pettazzoni’s own home in San Giorgio di Piano. Created in 2024, the intimate restaurant seats just 15 guests and opens by reservation, with bespoke menus shaped around the people gathered at the table.
Its connection to place extends to the kitchen. Pettazzoni and Zamboni seek out artisanal producers and work with small winemakers, farmers and breeders while combining family traditions with contemporary cooking techniques. Zamboni’s own heritage brings together Bologna and strong Sicilian family influences.
In a region celebrated around the world for its food, Comfort offers something particularly personal: an opportunity to experience local food culture inside a home.
Saving a Watermill—and Its Memories—in Liguria
Mulino di Roberto Pesce | Liguria
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For more than 20 years, an old watermill beside a stream in the Ligurian woods became much more than a building to its owner, Roberto Pesce.
His children and other young people swam, drew, created and spent time in nature there. Then, at the end of May 2026, a fire destroyed the roof. At the same time, years of erosion have brought the stream progressively closer to the structure.
Pesce is now raising funds to save the mill while imagining a new chapter for it: a small creative residency where young people could make art, experience nature and temporarily disconnect from technology.
It is a particularly intimate form of preservation. The goal isn’t simply to restore an old structure, but to protect a place shaped by landscape, memory and the generations who have gathered there.
Galleria Antonella Villanova: Jewelry Designed to Move
Galleria Antonella Villanova | Florence
antonellavillanova.it | Instagram: @galleria_antonella_villanova
At Galleria Antonella Villanova, jewelry becomes something closer to sculpture in motion.
Through November 1, the gallery’s TƎCA installation focuses on new works by Lavinia Rossetti, whose mobile and modular structures evolve through mathematical sequences. Rings intersect and transform into shapes, continuing Rossetti’s exploration of movement and the relationship between jewelry and the body.
The new pieces include a necklace, earrings and nine rings. Rossetti also works with techniques including filigree and braided wire, interpreting them through a contemporary visual language.
It is another way of looking at Italian craft: not as something fixed in the past, but as a vocabulary contemporary artists can continue to reshape.
SOLO: Experiencing Italy Independently
SOLO — Solo, Not Lonely | Pescara, Abruzzo
Buy the Book | Instagram: @solo_not_lonely_traveler
Traveling alone changes the relationship between traveler and place. Without someone else’s itinerary setting the pace, there can be more room to observe, wander and engage with the people encountered along the way.
Italian author and hotel manager Gerlando Fabio Sorrentino explores that experience in SOLO — Solo, Not Lonely: The Trusted Companion for the Independent Traveler in Italy.
Born in Agrigento and based in Abruzzo for more than 30 years, Sorrentino manages the Victoria Hotel in Pescara. His book combines practical guidance on transportation, accommodations, regional etiquette and safety with insights drawn from decades spent on the hospitality side of Italian travel.
Rather than another list of monuments to see, SOLO considers how independent travelers can become more confident navigating Italy—and perhaps experience it more closely in the process.
Movieland Brings Halloween to Lake Garda
Movieland – The Hollywood Park | Lazise, Lake Garda
CanevaWorld | Instagram: @movieland_officialpage
Not everything on our October radar is about looking backward.
From October 2 through November 1, Movieland – The Hollywood Park in Lazise transforms for its annual Halloween Season, bringing cinema, autumn atmosphere and special entertainment to Lake Garda.
This year’s program introduces a Halloween version of the park’s Disaster attraction, a Halloween Farm designed for younger visitors and the new live production Lost Souls – Le Anime Perdute. Special October dates also bring the Krampus of Alfagor Merano—and their Alpine folklore—to the park.
For families traveling through northern Italy this fall, it offers a very different addition to an itinerary around Lake Garda.
Vinitaly.USA Connects Italian Wine With the Places Behind It
Vinitaly.USA | New York City
Vinitaly | Instagram: VinitalyUSA.Official
When Vinitaly.USA returns to New York October 26–27, some 300 exhibitors will bring approximately 2,500 Italian wine labels to Pier 36. More than 400 buyers had already registered by September.
For travelers, however, one of the more interesting conversations extends beyond what’s in the glass.
Research conducted for Vinitaly Tourism among 750 U.S. travelers found that 79% associate Italy with authentic food-and-wine experiences, while 66% said combining wine experiences with historic cities and cultural sites increases Italy’s appeal. Sicily and Tuscany were among the regions generating particularly strong interest.
Wine tourism can offer an introduction not only to grapes and producers, but to landscapes, traditions and communities. In Italy, understanding what’s in the glass often begins with understanding where it came from.
The Craft Behind Italian Opera Comes to Miami
Istituto Italiano di Cultura di Miami | Coral Gables, Florida
Istituto Italiano di Cultura di Miami | Instagram: @IICMiami
We end outside Italy, where an exhibition in South Florida reveals the extraordinary amount of Italian artistry that takes place before an opera curtain ever rises.
Through November 27, L’Officina dell’Immaginario (The Workshop of Imagination) explores the workshops of the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma and the painters, costume designers, set designers, artisans and technicians who transform an artistic idea into a theatrical world.
The exhibition brings together 10 stage costumes designed by artists including Pablo Picasso, Renato Guttuso, Arnaldo Pomodoro and Mariano Fortuny; two original maquettes; approximately 40 historical photographs; and materials connected to the first performance of Puccini’s Tosca. An immersive room recreates the visual world of Renato Guttuso’s interpretation of The Rite of Spring.
The famous names may draw attention, but the exhibition’s larger story lies behind the scenes: generations of specialized knowledge and craftsmanship that remain part of Italy’s theatrical heritage.
Supporting Independent Cultural Journalism
Italy On Our Radar remains a curated editorial series focused on authentic Italian travel, culture and heritage. We welcome partnerships with brands and institutions committed to meaningful storytelling and long-term cultural value.
To explore editorial collaborations or sponsorship opportunities, please contact lisa @ liveinitalymag.com.
Another Way to Get On Our Radar
Throughout October, we’re also introducing Italian American entrepreneurs, creators and small businesses through our monthly Top 8 Instagram series.
Participants introduce themselves—and the story behind their business—through a Reel shared with the Live in Italy Magazine community.
Follow @liveinitalymag throughout October to meet this month’s Top 8.
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