Washington has the White House, Buenos Aires the Pink one. Brieva, a tiny village in the Spanish province of Segovia, has the Blue House. Not just any blue, but the intense Klein blue of the facade and front door of the home where Italian model and actress Lucía Bosé spent the last 23 years of her life.

A star who became a neighbor

The mother of singer Miguel Bosé, and of Lucía and Paola Dominguín, made this village of about a hundred people her home until her death in 2020. Here she wasn't a film star but a neighbor - loved, close, part of local life. According to people who knew her, she had her own group of friends she often got together with to paint, one of her great passions. Her bond with the village was so strong that the local community and cultural center now bears her name.

From hideaway to rental cottage

The house is built in the style of this rural corner of Segovia, with exposed stone walls like most houses in the village. It dates from around 1900, stood empty for a few years, and at the end of 2022 got new owners. After a renovation that kept most of the original features, it opened as a rural rental house for up to 28 guests.

At the entrance, the courtyard greets you straight away with a large outdoor dining area and a barbecue. Flowerpots, some in hanging baskets, planters on the ground and climbers running up the back wall turn the spot into a small green retreat. The house also has a small terrace.

The mural nobody was allowed to touch

The ground floor is arranged around a spacious living room with a fireplace, dominated by a large mural by Italian artist Emilio Farina, a personal friend of the actress. The new owners decided to keep it untouched, well aware it's one of the most valuable pieces in the house. Lucía loved to light the fire as soon as the cold months arrived, and the brick fireplace still draws guests into that same feeling of wood-fire warmth. The living room isn't built around a TV: for movies there's a second, cozier lounge right above it.

The kitchen everything revolves around

Next to the living room is the kitchen with an island, open to the dining area. The owners kept furniture that had been part of everyday life, such as the large original sideboard, along with several paintings and objects Lucía chose herself. There's a breakfast nook by the window, and the nod to the former owner is the fridge in Klein blue. They added something for fun too - a foosball table. Wooden ceilings meet stone walls, and the base of the island, clad in exposed brick, gives it a handmade touch.

The bedroom with the canopy

The main bedroom is on the ground floor, spacious and with its own bathroom, and it holds the canopy bed left over from when the house was a private home. An extra sofa bed adapts the room for groups. The other bedrooms are upstairs, with bunk beds and trundle beds - this is where the needs of a tourist rental show most clearly.

The most modern addition is a heated saltwater pool, which Lucía never got to enjoy, since it was built years after her death. The owners made an effort to keep the new from shouting over the old.

"Not a chance! I'm not moving from here!"

Lucía Bosé moved from the upscale Somosaguas neighborhood near Madrid to the foothills of the Guadarrama mountains. Her home also became a gathering place for part of Spanish society - regular guests included María Zurita de Borbón, a cousin of King Felipe VI, and the writer Boris Izaguirre. She gave the reasons herself: silence, few people, a healthy environment. Not even her son could budge her: "My son keeps trying to convince me to live with him again. Not a chance! I'm not moving from here!"

The owners admit that Lucía Bosé's name was the main draw for guests in the first year. Today, they say, people also come because of good reviews and word of mouth. How many stone houses in our own villages of a hundred people are waiting for someone to save them before time brings them down - without a star who once lived there?