The Stories These Olive Trees Could Tell

An olive harvest, a painting of Florence and a rather special connection to the past.

Nearly eighty years ago, a little boy was born in the house we now call our home in Chianni, Tuscany.

This week he came to help us pick olives.

When we bought our house here, I could never have imagined that one day we would be harvesting olives alongside someone who had been born within its walls all those years ago.

But that's one of the things I am discovering about life in Chianni. The longer we spend here, the more we learn about the people, the history and the stories that belong to this place.

And I absolutely love it.

The history of our olive grove

Alberto's older brother, Romano, once owned our olive grove.

During the exceptionally harsh winter of the mid-1980s, many of the olive trees were destroyed by the cold. Romano replanted them, and today, some forty years later, we are picking olives from those very same trees.

Sadly, Romano died around four years ago.

Alberto remembers harvesting olives here with his father and brother. In those days, they would often pick as late as January. He explained that although the quality of the oil wasn't necessarily as good, the quantity was greater.

Alberto also told us about life in Chianni years ago, when many of the local men worked either in agriculture or at the Piaggio factory in nearby Pontedera.

I find these conversations fascinating.

Whenever we see him, we have more questions about the house, the village and the olive grove. Different parts of our house have been bought and sold over the years, and there is so much history that we are only just beginning to discover.

Alberto was incredibly kind to us when we bought our home, and it is always such a pleasure to see him.

Picking olives together

This is our second olive harvest, and we have been spending long days among the trees, picking, clearing and gathering olives ready to take to the press.

It is hard work, but I love it.

This week Alberto joined us for a couple of hours.

There was something rather wonderful about watching him picking olives from the trees his brother had planted decades earlier.

We chatted about the history of Chianni, about Italy and Tuscany, and about the changes he has seen during his lifetime.

I often wish my Italian were better so that I could ask even more questions!

Before Alberto left, we made sure he had a bottle of our freshly pressed olive oil to enjoy.

After all, these trees have been part of his family's story for far longer than they have been part of ours.

A painting of Florence

There is another lovely part to this story.

Some time ago, he saw a collection of my paintings hanging in a local hotel restaurant. They had previously been exhibited in Florence.

Among them was my painting of Florence at night.

He had lived and worked in Florence, a city he loves, and he was quite definite that this was the painting he wanted to buy.

I can't tell you how much that meant to me.

As an artist, there is something incredibly rewarding about someone finding a personal connection with a painting.

But this felt particularly special.

Here was a man who had been so kind to us, who had known our home long before we arrived and whose brother had planted the olive trees we now care for, choosing one of my paintings because it reminded him of a place that meant so much to him.

And the painting itself had already spent time in an exhibition in Florence, the very city it depicted.

I found the whole thing quite emotional.

It is funny how life brings people together in ways you could never have anticipated.

A little robin

While we were in the olive grove, I also filmed a little robin.

There is a familiar saying:

A robin appears when loved ones are near.

And I couldn't help thinking about Romano.

I know it was simply a little bird, but I liked the thought of his brother being back among the trees they once picked together, with Romano somehow still part of the story.

Before he left, we told him that we hoped Romano would be happy to know we were doing our very best to look after his olive grove.

And that we absolutely adore every minute we spend there.

I really do hope that.

The stories we inherit

Afterwards, I put together a little film about Alberto, the olive grove and the history of the trees.

I wanted to share the story, but it was important to me that he was happy for me to do so.

When he watched it, he told us that he thought it was beautiful and that my words had moved him.

That meant such a lot.

I had simply wanted to tell a story about someone who has been so kind to us, and about the history of a place we have come to love.

But perhaps that's what makes these moments so special.

Our olive grove has around 280 trees, and looking after them is an enormous amount of work. There is always something to prune, clear, cut back or repair.

Some days I paint there. Some days I sit quietly and enjoy the view. And some days we work until we're absolutely exhausted.

But I never tire of being there.

When we bought our home in Chianni, we thought we were buying a little house and an olive grove.

What we hadn't realised was how many lives and stories were already woven into them.

And how lovely it would be to become part of their continuing history.

I hope Romano would be happy to know just how much we love his olive trees.

Natalie

Chianni, Tuscany — October 2026