Elton John is captivated by Salento: rumors of a purchase in Squinzano

When you think of Salento as a destination for so-called VIPs, who, after choosing it for their holidays, fell so in love with it that they bought a house, you think of Oscar-winning actress Helen Mirren. Together with her film director husband, Taylor Hackford (who also won an Oscar for a short film), the Anglo-American actress settled in Tiggiano in 2004, in a beautiful 16th-century farmhouse. But for having done so much earlier, in the 1970s, when the ancient Terra d'Otranto was still struggling to establish itself on the international tourism market, in terms of... Salento purchases, the trailblazer was an English Lord. Londoner Robert Alistair, Baron McAlpine of West Green, born in 1942, a writer and politician, and a close advisor to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, the famous Iron Lady, purchased the 15th-century former Franciscan convent dedicated to Santa Maria di Costantinopoli in the hamlet of Diso, Marittima. With the guidance of his Greek wife, Athena Malpas, a plant collector, he transformed it into a first-class private residence. After his death there on January 17, 2014, it became a luxury hotel. Around the elegant cloister, each room is beautifully displayed with souvenirs acquired during his travels around the world.

Also long-standing is the arrival, but in Castiglione d'Otranto, a hamlet of Andrano, of actress Paola Pitagora, owner of an ancient residence, and in the ever-popular Otranto, of illustrator and cartoonist Giorgio Forattini. Meanwhile, in the hamlet of Tricase, Depressa, home to the Angevin-era castle of the Winspeare family of Anglo-Neapolitan origin (yes, the family of film director Edoardo), former ambassador Staffan De Mistura, a naturalized Italian Swede, has long since settled with his family in a prestigious old house. Also long-standing is the presence of Belgian record producer Charles Adriaenssen, who for the past fifteen years has organized a major chamber music festival, the "Muse Salentine," in one of the two historic Palazzo Sangiovanni he purchased in Alessano's Piazza Castello. The same goes for another "great" of cinema, director Francis Ford Coppola, who owns a farmhouse in the municipality of Ugento; for RAI journalist Duilio Giammaria in Tricase, where the Roman painter and photographer Silvio Pellicano also lives; for the son of the designer Etro, Jacopo, in Matino, with its 17th-century Palazzo Giannelli and frescoed rooms on the first floor; and for television presenter Serena Dandini, with a beautiful home in the aforementioned Marittima.

Among the latest arrivals, singer Giorgia has arrived in Galatina, with Palazzotto in the historic center, where she has also opened an elegant bistro. Just a year ago, Roman journalist Selvaggia Lucarelli, with her partner Lorenzo Bigiarelli, a chef and food blogger, moved into Giuliano, a hamlet of Castrignano del Capo. The journalist already had a strong and long-standing connection with Salento. Her son, Leon, is the fruit of her union with Laerte Pappalardo, son of the well-known singer Adriano from Copertino.

Also new is the Florentine journalist, writer, and television commentator Antonella Boralevi, who has made Minervino a home in a small village of 3,500 inhabitants. Minervino has two hamlets, Cocumola and Specchia Gallone, whose ancient villages are among the most beautiful and best-preserved in the entire province.

On the subject of music, for a year now, Alfredo Rapetti, known as Cheope, the only one of the lyricist Mogol's four sons to have followed in his father's footsteps, has made a historic home his own in Cannole, after carefully restoring it.

In Salve, on a plot of land in the surrounding countryside, internationally renowned architect and designer Massimo Iosa Ghini, a former RAI consultant and curator of the 2010 Venice Architecture Biennale, built for himself and his wife Milena, a pizzica enthusiast, a minimalist villa with a swimming pool, perfectly integrated into the surrounding nature. Prickly pears and Mediterranean shrubs and plants stand out all around.

In the city of Lecce, where the controversial French actor Gerard Depardieu once purchased a palazzo a stone's throw from Piazza Duomo, on the central Via Salvatore Trinchese, lives the writer Catena Fiorello, who has a somewhat special relationship with Salento, since her partner, the lawyer Paolo Spalluto, is from Squinzano.

Art historian Peter Benson Miller and Giovanni Panebianco, president of the “Premio Paganini,” an international competition for young pianists, have instead settled in the smallest municipality in the province of Lecce, Giuggianello, with just 1,100 inhabitants.

In Nardò, a town of 30,000 inhabitants, the second most populous city after Lecce, is Guy Martin, the Michelin-starred French chef of the Parisian restaurant "Le Grand' Véfour." With his interior design partner, Katherina Marx, in the historic center he has taken the 18th-century Maritati and Muci buildings, to which he recently added another residence in Piazza San Matteo, and transformed them into modern guest houses . Martin has locations in China and Polynesia, but when he arrived in Salento for a holiday in 2015, he immediately fell in love. Now he comes once a month, and in the summer he stays as long as possible. And speaking of designers, in Bagnolo del Salento, another esteemed professional, Francois Man, a Londoner, has purchased a charming old village house.

Also hailing from London are director, art director, set designer, and musician Harvey B-Brown and entrepreneur Steven Riseley, with a background in design and project management, who have made the castle-like "Casina Bice" in Monte Sant'Elia di Trepuzzi their own, renaming it Castle Elvira and turning it into a luxury boutique hotel . Among other British celebrities, such as Brian Ferry, the two are friends of Elton John, who, according to unconfirmed but also undeniable rumors, is interested in purchasing the imposing Palazzo Pedone in nearby Squinzano after his (alleged) quick visit to Salento.

In Spongano, recently moved from New York, the screenwriter Francesca Marciano, fresh from winning a David di Donatello for the film by the actress and now director, Valeria Golino, The Art of Joy , as well as on the cliffs of Castro, where the multi-Michelin-starred Giorgio Locatelli, one of the world's leading culinary experts, has a villa.

And since they've been frequenting Capo di Leuca for several years, Roman Giulia Barela, a designer of nature-inspired jewelry, and journalist and shareholder of the Frescobaldi wine group, Tiziana Frescobaldi, must also have a home in Salento.