Stay at Ansitz Layshof, a new guesthouse in Merano’s Maia Alta neighbourhood, and you might well find the owners’ three children playing football on the garden lawn behind the historic property with new-found friends lodging for the weekend. “It’s a family-like atmosphere as it always has been,” says Christa Klotzner, who runs the place with her husband Andreas. “But now it’s for everyone.”

The beautiful, traditional South Tyrolean house – a stone’s throw from the Dolomites – can trace its history back to 1254 and has been in Andreas’s family for more than 150 years. Until recently, though, it was a private farmhouse. Even today, the tractor parked in a dark-wood barn round the corner from the main building points to Andreas’s main job, tending nearby fields. Hailing from the fifth generation of apple farmers, he grew up in the home with his five sisters, parents and nonna. “There was always family in the house visiting my grandmother,” he says.

With the passage of time, it became clear that the house needed work – and was too big for the family’s changing needs. “We got to a situation where we had to decide whether we wanted to go somewhere else to live or refurbish it,” says Christa. The couple, who took over the farm in 2013, decided on the latter, embarking on an ambitious two-year project that converted part of the space into a guesthouse. The work retained the beautiful wooden beams, old doors and stucco ceilings that date to the 18th century, focusing on much-needed structural updates such as restoring the roof and stabilising the structure. Happily for Christa, who jokes that she was always cold when she first moved in, there is now central heating throughout.

The five spacious guest apartments – all with kitchens and one with a private rooftop sauna – are set over the first and second floors, with the owners living at ground level. The rooms mix tasteful contemporary oak parquet with original pieces from the family, including traditionally painted Tyrolean cupboards and sturdy wooden beds.

At one point during the thorough renovation, the couple understood that they needed a designer’s magic touch. “When the work was almost done – and we had wanted to do a lot ourselves – we realised that we needed some help,” says Andreas. The couple drafted in a designer who grew up in Maia Alta, Harry Thaler, the man behind the Monocle Design Awards trophy, who had gone to school with one of Andreas’s sisters.

Thaler’s flourishes take Ansitz Layshof to the next level. As well as turning his attention to all the room lamps, he designed a mezzanine level in the “Weyer” apartment and advised on the rooms’ armchairs. But it’s his work in the firstfloor communal area that stands out the most. The huge, sculptural copper chandelier hangs from the ceiling above a circular sage-green sofa – also Thaler’s work – juxtaposing wonderfully with old paintings and a grandfather clock set against a wall. “When we saw how beautiful the restoration was,” says Christa, “we knew that we wanted to share it with others.”
layshof.com