As "palace hotels" go, this one is only middling. The architecture is fairly bland. Our room was mostly hard floors and hard walls. Compare the roomful of art you get at Castle Ivrea near Valle d'Aosta (NW Italy), or compare the Schloss Hirschorn above the Nekkar River in Germany--both of those are far more impressive. And you have to drive through a lot of pedestrian-only narrow streets to get there by car. We parked below the town (only 100 yds from the hotel), but the online map didn't show that the connecting trail was a set of super-steep, long stone staircases. So carrying suitcases up is a no go. I absolutely will not stay there again. Wonderful people, though. Oh, and the breakfast was disappointing--a lot of food there but not much of it we could eat. Has nobody heard of whole grains?