THE ARTHOUSE IS 5 YEARS OLD!
This week in 2011, I moved into an abandoned house, having put down a 2,000 euro deposit, with the pledge to pay the remaining 8,000 the next year.
Looking back at that point in particular, my diary entries are literally euphoric – I write about how ‘everything is shiny and tingling’ and how ‘it feels like I’m in a dream’ – it was so hard to believe that I finally had my own home, and could start building a magical life of creative freedom.
5 long years – and several adventures – later, and that initial enthusiasm rings true: the feeling that I acted on, in throwing everything I had (and didn’t have!) at this extraordinary house in this incredible town – it all came good!
This year, and this month, are also super-special for other important reasons: there’s a sense of everything alchemising, all the hurdles falling away, and the road ahead being clear and bright before me.
A new energy is coming into everything, and I’m working consciously to have gratitude for this: here’s a brief tour of the whole house, as I take time today to give thanks to Spirit for having guided me here, and for having kept me buoyed during these blessed years.
“THANK YOU UNIVERSE FOR MY HAPPY & CREATIVE LIFE IN THIS MAGICAL ARTHOUSE!”
To re-cap if you don’t know my story: in 2011 I gambled the last of my inheritance from my mum on a house which had been abandoned for 16 yrs.
Which lay deep in a medieval quarter, the better part of which had been abandoned for the better part of 30 yrs.
Didn’t speak Italian, didn’t know anyone, didn’t have an income or the promise of one, no support network, and just a few hundred euros in the bank, to get me started.
5 yrs, two episodes of House Hunters International, several exhibitions and festivals and performances and pop-up shops, a language school, 150+ paintings and three books later… and all is well at the Arthouse – AND all is well in Guardia Sanframondi’s centro storico, as a flux of foreign visitors and house-buyers continues to flow!
photo by Kat Tan for Muse Radio
HOORAY FOR DREAMS – AND FOR FOLKS WHO FOLLOW THEM!
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Congratulations Clare! There are always a lot of people who have the dream part figured out. But to dream it, and then put it all together, bit by bit and piece by piece, good days, bad days, rain or shine… Breathing life into it as you go. This is an magnificent talent. And as if this isn’t enough… You share… beautifully, openly, and from the heart. Thank you not only for what you do, but even more for who you are.
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Oh gosh, your words mean a lot – I always get a bit nervous about what I just posted, but when there’s good feedback, phew! 😀
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Oh Clare – I have been watching your video blogs and think you are just amazing and inspiring! You are very brave. I hope I can use a little of your courage to follow my dream. Please keep following your dreams and sharing them. You might just give me the push I need! Thank you!
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That is so wonderful to hear, dear Jamie! Yey – go for it, and we’ll see you here some day soon!
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