A corridor with a wooden floor cut into bands by light from the side windows
101

Nine apartments · three floors · one key each

The nine

They are not named after saints or grapes. The number on the tag is the number on the door, and the first digit is the floor you are climbing to.

The second-floor corridor, 16:25, with both end windows open

Casa Ventuno

Via dei Perroni 21 · Lecce

101Primo · sleeps 2 · 28 m²
145102Primo · sleeps 2 · 36 m²
155103Primo · sleeps 3 · 44 m²
165201Secondo · sleeps 2 · 38 m²
175202Secondo · sleeps 2 · 41 m²
180203Secondo · sleeps 3 · 52 m²
190301Terzo · sleeps 2 · 39 m²
210302Terzo · sleeps 2 · 45 m²
215303Terzo · sleeps 4 · 71 m²
240

Low season, per night, in euro · campanello a destra

The plate by the bell

It is screwed to the jamb on the right of the street door, and it has been repolished so many times that the 2 of 203 has nearly gone. Everything on this page is on that plate, in the same order.

Rates rise by about 30 % between June and September and by 45 % over the week of Ferragosto. Nothing else changes: same linen, same bread, same key.

Primo pianoVaulted, thick-walled, no air conditioning and none wanted
101
A warm low-lit bedroom with a padded headboard and a curtain half drawn

One room, one window, the courtyard side

The smallest door in the house and the one we would take ourselves in July. Twenty-eight square metres, a shower, a two-ring hob, and a window that looks into the arch rather than the street.

Sleeps 228 m²ShowerFrom 145 €
102
Tall shuttered French windows standing open at the foot of a bed

Two French windows onto the first balcony

The brightest of the three on this floor. Both windows open fully onto a balcony wide enough for two chairs and a cup, which is all anyone has ever put on it.

Sleeps 236 m²BalconyFrom 155 €
103
Sheer curtains filled with afternoon light at a tall window

A separate bedroom, and the kitchen under the vault

A sofa bed takes a third person, usually a child. The vault over the kitchen is the original one and it keeps the room four degrees under the street all summer.

Sleeps 344 m²Vaulted kitchenFrom 165 €
Secondo pianoThe green floor, painted in 1961 and left alone
201
An armchair turned towards a bright window with a small side table

The chair by the window, and the coolest air in August

No air conditioning, because the ceiling is protected and we are not allowed to drill it. Cross-ventilation and a metre of tufo do the work; guests who booked it twice booked it again.

Sleeps 238 m²No air conFrom 175 €
202
An armchair with a checked throw beside a wooden stool on a round jute rug

The long room, with the rug that came with the house

Forty-one square metres in one piece: bed at one end, table at the other, and a rug we had rewoven in Nardò rather than replaced. The desk takes a laptop and nothing larger.

Sleeps 241 m²DeskFrom 180 €
203
A dark bathroom in veined stone with a timber vanity and one warm lamp

The only bath in the building

Cast iron, re-enamelled, and heavy enough that the floor had to be checked before it went in. The street balcony is here too, so this is the noisy one on a Saturday and we say so when you book.

Sleeps 352 m²BathFrom 190 €
Terzo pianoSixty-four steps, low ceilings, roofline on three sides
301
A dark timber-lined passage with a wide window looking into dense green

Lined in old chestnut, looking into the fig

The hall was panelled by a carpenter who lived here until 1998, and the window at the end sits level with the neighbour's fig tree. It is the darkest apartment and people sleep late in it.

Sleeps 239 m²Timber hallFrom 210 €
302
A bathroom lined floor to ceiling in heavily veined pale marble

Walled in the stone they dug out of the courtyard

When the cistern was opened in 2019 we took eleven slabs out of it, and they went up here. The shower is the biggest in the house. There is no bath and there is no room for one.

Sleeps 245 m²Large showerFrom 215 €
303
A white mug standing in low window light on a worn wooden table

Two bedrooms and the door onto the terrace

The largest apartment, and the one with the terrace door, which everybody in the house may use between 08:00 and 23:00. The table in the photograph is where most people end up at nine in the morning.

Sleeps 471 m²Terrace doorFrom 240 €
A white balcony planted with red geraniums beneath a window with green shutters

Shared, every apartment, 08:00 — 23:00

The geraniums are counted

Signora Pizzolante has kept them on the second-floor balcony since 1994 and replaces any that die at her own expense. The terrace above has four chairs, one table and no lighting after eleven, on purpose.

In every one of the nine

The same things behind every door

Bed160 × 200, horsehair over pocket springs, turned twice a yearLinenFlax from Martina Franca, washed at 60°, changed on the fourth morningKitchenTwo rings, a sink, a fridge, a moka and six of everythingWaterGas heater on the landing, hot in nine seconds, never shared between two doorsWifiFibre, 300 down, one network, the password is on the key tagNot includedA television. There is one in the arch and nobody has ever switched it on
A stack of folded white linen seen close up
The Tuesday stack, before it goes up the stairs
A kitchen with a green tiled splashback and a person standing at the counter
The green tiles went into six kitchens in 2021
05

The questions people actually send

Answered by whoever is on the desk, in writing, usually within the hour. There is no chatbot and there is not going to be one.

+39 0832 27 10 21
09:00 — 19:00, every day but Sunday
Is there really no lift?

None, and there never will be: the stairwell is listed. Twenty-two steps to the first floor, forty-three to the second, sixty-four to the third. We carry the bags up and down ourselves and we mean it.

Which apartments have air conditioning?

Seven of the nine. 201 and 103 do not, because their ceilings are protected and we cannot run the pipework. Both sit under a metre of tufo and stay around 24° through August; if that worries you, book another number.

Can you park?

Not on the street — the whole quarter is a limited traffic zone and the cameras are real. The garage on Via Taranto is nine minutes on foot and 18 € a day; we register your plate so the fine does not arrive in March.

Children, cots, third beds?

A cot is 12 € the stay and fits in every apartment except 101. A third bed only exists in 103, 203 and 303, which is why they sleep three or four. We will not put a camp bed in a two-person room for any money.

Dogs?

Two per apartment, 20 € the stay, and they are welcome in the arch and on the terrace. Not on the beds, which is a losing battle we fight anyway. Tell us the size so we know which stair to warn you about.

A brass key with a numbered tag left hanging in the lock of a weathered door

Say a number, or say a week and let us choose

Most people give us the dates and a sentence about what they want — quiet, bright, a bath, a terrace — and we come back with one number rather than nine.

Ask for a date