Villa Treville – Zeffirelli's cliffside stage above Positano

Villa Treville climbs a cliff above the hamlet of Arienzo, a hairpin bend below Positano, in a house that began life in the eighteenth century as a retreat built for the Duchess of Villarosa, Fernanda Rocchi Notarbartolo di Villarosa. Franco Zeffirelli bought it in the 1960s and lived there for more than four decades, filling the rooms with set pieces from his own films and operas and receiving guests who read like a cast list: Maria Callas, Leonard Bernstein, Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton. He sold the estate in 2007; it opened as a 16-suite hotel in 2009, spread across four villas in two hectares of garden, still small enough to feel like somebody's house rather than an institution. That scale, and the theatrical, Moorish-tinged interiors Zeffirelli left behind, are a large part of why the MICHELIN Guide gives Villa Treville Two Keys.

01The house

Long before it welcomed hotel guests, Villa Treville was an eighteenth-century retreat built for the Duchess of Villarosa, Fernanda Rocchi Notarbartolo di Villarosa, set into the cliff above the sea.

Franco Zeffirelli discovered the property in the 1960s, bought it and made it his home for more than forty years, during which time he saw Positano change from an obscure fishing village into one of the world's most celebrated destinations for cultured guests.

He reworked the house piece by piece: archival photographs and building records trace the addition of vaulted ceilings and traditional Amalfitan tiles, along with custom furnishings, antiques and reused set-design elements from his film and opera work, reinterpreted with motifs borrowed from North African and Middle Eastern architecture.

He sold the villa in 2007, after summing up for his biographer the roll-call of friends who had passed through – Bernstein, Olivier, Callas, Taylor – as a story that already sounded like legend. The estate opened as a hotel in 2009 under Giovanni Russo.

In 2025 the Neapolitan architect Antonio Girardi reworked the outdoor spaces, including Maestro's restaurant and the beach area of the former home. Keeping Zeffirelli's own design language intact was the brief, so the team chose Bonacina rattan furnishings the director had favoured, alongside ceramic tiles by local maker Lucio Liguori and sea-sponge artwork by Paolo Sandulli.

The villa's history now has its own shelf: an Assouline monograph, Villa Treville Positano, by Nicky Swallow and Govind Friedland, was published in May 2026 and sits in the estate's library.

02Rooms and suites

The 16 suites are set across four villas stitched into the hillside – Villa Bianca, Villa Rosa, Villa Azzurra and Villa Tre Pini – each with its own terrace, garden or balcony.

Insider tip

Reached on foot from Positano centre in about fifteen minutes, or by the hotel's own boat.

Categories climb from Junior Suites to a Four Bedroom Suite, and several carry the names of the guests who once filled them, among them suites dedicated to Maria Callas and Leonard Bernstein.

The largest, the Zeffirelli suite, spreads across four independent bedrooms each with its own bathroom, a shared living and dining space, and a heated plunge pool on its outdoor terrace.

Several of the two- and three-bedroom suites add their own heated plunge pools, access to an outdoor gym, sunbeds down on the rocks and a Treville breakfast served wherever guests choose to eat it.

03Where to eat

Maestro's occupies Villa Azzurra's terrace, the spot Zeffirelli once chose for his own gatherings, looking past the cliff edge towards the Li Galli islands. By night, lanterns replace daylight and the terrace turns theatrical, much as it would have for its original owner.

The kitchen is run by chef Vincenzo Castaldo, who has spent fourteen years working in kitchens across Italy before taking the helm here, building his menu around produce grown in the estate's own garden and serving everything from breakfast to candlelit dinner.

04The bar

Bianca Bar occupies the Salone Bianca inside Villa Bianca, a white, Moorish-inspired room built within Zeffirelli's grand design, lined today with filigree furniture and mirrored surfaces that once framed the gatherings of his famous guests.

The hotel's cliffside garden supplies more than the kitchen: herbs and botanicals grown there are distilled on site for Bianca Bar's cocktails, the terrace doubling as a small microbrewery for its own creations.

05Spa and wellbeing

La Traviata Spa, set in a greenhouse-like winter garden, is where Dr Barbara Sturm – herself a regular guest – has placed her skincare line, alongside a gym, a marble-lined Turkish bath and a cold plunge pool with sea views.

For guests who prefer not to leave their rooms, therapists will bring treatments to the suite instead, a detail that fits a house built first and foremost as somebody's private retreat.

06The neighbourhood

Positano's centre is close enough to reach on foot – about fifteen minutes down the steps – or by the hotel's own boat, while Sorrento lies seventeen kilometres along the coast road.

The private beach club, On the Rocks, is reached by a lift carved directly into the cliff face, with a floating pool set above the water and a traditional wooden boat, the San Fernando II, running guests back towards the village or out towards a chartered yacht.

07Making the most of a stay

Book a table at Maestro's as the lanterns are lit rather than for an early dinner, when the terrace turns from a sea view into a small piece of theatre. Ask for a treatment at La Traviata before the garden's midday heat sets in, and take the cliff lift down to On the Rocks for an afternoon at the floating pool rather than the hotel's own, smaller pool. Before heading down into Positano itself, a few minutes in the library with the new Assouline monograph on the house is worth the detour – it is, after all, a rare case of a hotel's own history being more cinematic than anything printed about it elsewhere.

For a weekend. For a lifetime.