The new villa

"Why not blog about villas?" Someone recently suggested.
And why not! I live in a continent full of villas, from Scotland to Turkey and everywhere in between. This vast area was once the Roman empire and the Romans gave us the villa.

The villa I have for you today is in Spain and has only recently been finished. No one has moved in on a permanent basis and except for the beds, sparce furnishing and cushions this villa is empty, but that's the thing with villas, even occupied they should look spacious and empty.

Outside lighting with Spanish tiles

Creating good lighting isn't difficult and needn't be expensive, but it does require a little thought before fixing the light source. The outside area of this house below is lit entirely using pierced roof tiles like the ones in the first photograph.

The tiles cost just cents to buy and are made out of terracotta that's easy to drill and cut. The lighting can be adjusted by drilling more holes or cutting a line, whatever is prefered.

Roof tile lights

I think it looks good! The contrast is pleasing and there's enough light to show the form of the house against the night sky, it looks like stage lighting.

Yes, I did dive in.

La casita

Let's go for a swim and spend the day at the casita.

Casita, it means small house and in this instance it refers to a small house next to the pool. The typical casita will have a cooker and fridge to prepare food and drink, books, magazines, board games, comfortable chairs and sometimes a day bed. You will usually find a radio but you'll never find a television.

For those of you with enough land to hide your pool out of sight, I thoroughly recommend a casita! Leaving your house and walking a couple of hundred yards to the casita is like going on holiday for the day.