The 8 prettiest villages within 90 minutes of Turin

1. Bard

Best for a long lunch. A food guide lists Ad Gallias here.

1 h 12 min from Turin · homes €1,050 to €1,550 a m² in the center · 102 people

Why visit Bard

Bard sits at the entrance of the Aosta Valley, its single medieval street wedged between the Dora Baltea river and the rocky prominence that carries the fortress above it. The rock has been fortified since late antiquity: an Ostrogothic garrison held it in the sixth century, in Theodoric's time, and a record of 1034 already calls the castle impregnable.

That older fort was razed after the 1800 siege, and the Savoy engineer Antonio Francesco Olivero rebuilt the current three-tier complex on the same ground between 1830 and 1838. The village below is compact by design: one main street, noble houses from the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and a parish church rebuilt several times over the medieval core.

The rock and the river leave no room for the town to spread, so fortress and village occupy the same narrow footprint, one stacked above the other rather than side by side. What the place adds up to is a defensive chokepoint that never had space to become anything but a single street and the walls above it.

What to see in Bard

• Forte di Bard. Three terraced levels climb the fortress rock above the village. The current structure replaced an older fort that Napoleon ordered demolished after taking it.
• Museo delle Alpi. Permanent museum inside the fortress, dedicated to the Alps as a geographical, cultural and human space, with rotating contemporary art exhibitions.
• Borgo medievale di Bard. Medieval village stretched along a single main street, lined with fifteenth- and sixteenth-century mansions and noble houses below the fortress rock.

How to get to Bard

Turin is about 1 h 12 min away by road. The full route from Turin.

Everything we know about Bard

2. Fontainemore

Best for a small town. 447 people live here.

1 h 22 min from Turin · homes €1,200 to €1,600 a m² in the center · 447 people

Why visit Fontainemore

Fontainemore is the easternmost commune of the Aosta Valley, set against the Mont Mars Nature Reserve in the middle of the Lys Valley. The Lys was settled in the Middle Ages by Walser communities from the upper valley, who left fragments of patois further upstream along with their building style.

The toponym comes from either Fontaine de Saint-Maur or Fontaine de la mort, the second tied to local legend rather than record. The historic center and the parish church sit close together at the valley floor, the working part of the village grouped around its bridge, while the reserve and the pilgrimage track rise above toward the pass.

Fontainemore was admitted to Borghi più Belli d'Italia in September 2023. The village reads as a settlement shaped as much by the route passing over it as by the valley it sits in: a crossing point first, a destination after.

What to see in Fontainemore

• Ponte medievale sul Lys. The arch clears the river next to the parish church and carries a footpath rather than road traffic, having outlasted its original use.
• Chiesa parrocchiale di San Giovanni Battista. Dedicated to John the Baptist, the church has stood as the religious center of the village since the late Middle Ages, set right beside the bridge.
• Centro storico. The rows sit tight together: haylofts, stalls and houses under one layout, balconies still carrying flowers against the stone and wood.

How to get to Fontainemore

Turin is about 1 h 22 min away by road.

Everything we know about Fontainemore

3. Barolo

Best for Barolo DOCG. The town gives its name to Barolo DOCG.

1 h 3 min from Turin · homes €980 to €1,450 a m² in the center · 617 people

Why visit Barolo

Barolo sits at 301 meters on a Langhe hilltop fifty-five kilometers south of Torino, in the heart of the DOCG appellation that takes its name. The Castello Falletti rises from the center of the village; its oldest walls go back to the tenth century, when Berengar I of Italy granted local lords permission to fortify against Hungarian and Saracen raids.

The Falletti family acquired Barolo from Alba in 1250, settled in the castle by 1325, and held it for more than six centuries. In the 1830s the Marchesi Tancredi and Giulia Falletti, alongside Camillo Benso di Cavour and his oenologist Paolo Francesco Staglieno, are credited with pushing the Nebbiolo of these hills toward dry, age-worthy wine.

The village bought the castle by public subscription in 1970. Since 2010 it has housed the WiMu, a wine museum laid out by François Confino.

The Cannubi cru, on the next hill, is said to be the first vineyard name in the appellation to appear in writing, on a bottle dated 1752. Barolo is one of eleven communes inside the DOCG zone and part of the UNESCO Langhe-Roero and Monferrato landscape inscribed in 2014.

The catch: It has lost 18% of its people since 2015.

What to see in Barolo

• Castello Falletti. Tenth-century castle rebuilt by the Falletti, who held Barolo from 1250, bought by the comune in 1970, now home to the WiMu wine museum since 2010.
• WiMu - Museo del Vino. Wine museum inside the castle, designed by François Confino, with the Regional Wine Library of Barolo in the cellars.
• Vigneto Cannubi. Historic cru on the hill east of the village, its name said to appear on a bottle dated 1752, the earliest written vineyard name in Barolo.

How to get to Barolo

Turin is about 1 h 3 min away by road.

Everything we know about Barolo

4. Cocconato

Best for a wine weekend. It belongs to the national association of wine towns.

57 min from Turin · homes €530 to €780 a m² in the center · 1,399 people

Why visit Cocconato

Cocconato sits thirty kilometers east of Torino, on a ridge whose south-facing slope catches enough sun to keep olives, palms and mimosas alive this far north, the reason locals call the area the Riviera del Monferrato. From the tenth century the ridge was held by the Radicati counts, a Manfredian family, as an imperial fief for four hundred years, until 1586: the centro storico that survives is their seat, not a later reconstruction.

The town's two anchors sit close together but answer to different authorities. The civic palace, built in the fifteenth century, faces the seventeenth-century parish church of Santa Maria della Consolazione across the upper piazza, government and religion holding opposite ends of the same small square.

Beyond the built center, the ridge opens onto a belvedere looking south across vineyards toward the Alta Langa and, on clear days, the Monviso massif. Since 1970 the six frazioni of Airali, Brina, Colline Magre, San Carlo, Torre and Tuffo have raced their donkeys in the Palio degli Asini, a modern rivalry laid over an old administrative one.

Cocconato holds the Bandiera Arancione, a fitting distinction for a ridge that has been organizing the same handful of parts, fief, palace, church, frazioni, for centuries.

What to see in Cocconato

• Palazzo Comunale. Pointed-arch porticoes and terracotta-framed windows on the Late Gothic facade, still the building the ridge town organizes itself around.
• Chiesa di Santa Maria della Consolazione. Seventeenth-century parish church anchoring the upper piazza, the religious counterweight to the medieval civic palace below it.
• Centro storico. Medieval ridge town that was the seat of the Radicati counts from the tenth century until 1586, well preserved on the south-facing slope.

How to get to Cocconato

Turin is about 57 min away by road. The full route from Turin.

Everything we know about Cocconato

5. Monforte d'Alba

Best for Barolo DOCG. The town gives its name to Barolo DOCG.

1 h 8 min from Turin · homes €980 to €1,450 a m² in the center · 1,874 people

Why visit Monforte d'Alba

Monforte d'Alba sits at 480 meters in the southeastern corner of the Barolo zone, sixty kilometers from Torino. The name is from Latin mons fortis, fortified hill, and the medieval village climbed steep enough to make it nearly impregnable.

In 1028, Archbishop Ariberto d'Intimiano of Milan had the inhabitants of a heretical community here, later identified as Cathars, captured and burned in Milan to halt the spread of their teaching. Monforte is one of the eleven Barolo communes and accounts for some of the most structured, tannic wines in the zone, particularly from the Bussia and Ginestra crus.

At the top of the village, the Auditorium Horszowski occupies what was once the main square: an open-air natural amphitheater of 800 seats named for the pianist Mieczysław Horszowski, who opened it with a concert in 1986. The Monfortinjazz festival has run here every summer since 1976.

What to see in Monforte d'Alba

• Auditorium Horszowski. Open-air amphitheater for 800 carved into the old village square in 1986, named for the pianist who opened it that year.
• Centro storico. Steep medieval village climbing to the old piazza, with Renaissance palazzi and the surviving bell tower of Sant'Agostino.
• Chiesa di Santa Elisabetta. Baroque oratory beside the Palazzo Scarampi at the top of the village, framing the back wall of the Horszowski stage.

How to get to Monforte d'Alba

Turin is about 1 h 8 min away by road.

Everything we know about Monforte d'Alba

6. Neive

Best for a trip without a car. The train stops in the commune.

1 h 6 min from Turin · homes €860 to €1,250 a m² in the center · 3,211 people

Why visit Neive

Neive sits at 308 meters on a Langhe ridge, fifty kilometers southeast of Torino and eight kilometers from Alba. The name traces to the gens Naevia, a Roman family that held the land in antiquity.

The medieval village was fought over between Asti and Alba; its castle was destroyed in 1276 and rebuilt repeatedly through the Middle Ages. The Torre dell'Orologio dates from 1224 and embeds a Roman funeral plaque to Valeria Terza in its wall, a deliberate piece of spolia from the older settlement.

Neive is one of three Barbaresco communes (with Barbaresco and Treiso) and is the one locals call the township of four wines: Barbera, Dolcetto, Moscato and Nebbiolo all produced in commercial volume from the same hills. The centro storico is Borghi più belli, eight centuries of layered building stacked tightly enough that the old gates still mark the entry to the village.

What to see in Neive

• Torre dell'Orologio. Civic tower of 1224 with a Roman funeral plaque to Valeria Terza set in its wall, the symbol of Neive's centro storico.
• Centro storico. Hilltop Borghi più belli village stacked across eight centuries, with surviving medieval gates and Renaissance palazzi.
• Palazzo del Municipio. White Baroque civic palace on the main piazza, decorated with arch motifs and standing beside the Torre dell'Orologio.

How to get to Neive

It has its own railway station. Turin is about 1 h 6 min away by road. The full route from Turin.

Everything we know about Neive

7. Guarene

Best for a wine weekend. It belongs to the national association of wine towns.

1 h 2 min from Turin · homes €970 to €1,450 a m² in the center · 3,532 people

Why visit Guarene

Guarene sits at 360 meters on the left bank of the Tanaro, the last hill of the Roero before the river crosses to Alba and the Langhe. The Roero family, powerful Asti bankers, took the village in 1379 and held it until the line ended with Count Alessandro in 1899.

Count Carlo Giacinto Roero rebuilt the medieval fortress between 1726 and his death, turning it into a baroque summer residence; his sons completed the work and hosted the king and queen of Sardinia here in 1773. The castle is now a Relais & Châteaux hotel with a small museum.

On the slope below the village, the Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo opened Palazzo Re Rebaudengo in 1997 as its first contemporary art space; the foundation added an open-air sculpture park in 2019 with works by Carsten Höller, Marguerite Humeau, and Paul Kneale set among pear orchards and Nebbiolo rows. The town holds four designations at once: Borghi più belli, Bandiera Arancione, Spighe Verdi and Città del Vino.

What to see in Guarene

• Castello di Guarene. Eighteenth-century baroque castle rebuilt 1726 by Count Carlo Giacinto Roero from a medieval fortress, now a Relais & Châteaux hotel.
• Palazzo Re Rebaudengo. Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo's first contemporary art space, opened 1997 in an eighteenth-century palazzo in the village.
• Parco d'arte Sandretto Re Rebaudengo. Open-air sculpture park opened 2019 with works by Carsten Höller, Marguerite Humeau, and Paul Kneale among Nebbiolo rows and pear orchards.

How to get to Guarene

Turin is about 1 h 2 min away by road.

Everything we know about Guarene

8. Castagnole delle Lanze

Best for a slow weekend. The Touring Club gives it its orange flag for small inland towns.

1 h 12 min from Turin · homes €500 to €750 a m² in the center · 3,642 people

Why visit Castagnole delle Lanze

Fifteen kilometers south of Asti, Castagnole delle Lanze lies in the UNESCO Vineyard Landscape of Piedmont, on ground once crossed by a Roman road branching off the Via Aemilia between Acqui and Pollenzo. In the Middle Ages the lands belonged to the counts of Loreto, with Manfredo I the count most tied to the community; their castle, probably destroyed in 1255 when the contado fell, has not survived, and from the thirteenth century the town passed under the Comune of Asti.

The main square and Piazza Balbo hold the two churches that anchor the lower town, while the Parco della Rimembranza occupies the highest ground of the village, looking over the Tinella and Tanaro valleys. What remains is a settlement built in layers: a Roman route, a lost medieval castle, a pair of Baroque churches, and a nineteenth-century tower, each belonging to a different century and none of them replacing the one before it.

What to see in Castagnole delle Lanze

• Chiesa di San Pietro in Vincoli. Parish church of 1681 on the main square, Ligurian-Piedmontese Baroque with a twin-bell-tower façade.
• Chiesa dei Battuti Bianchi. Confraternity church of 1668 in Piazza Balbo, deconsecrated and now used as a space for cultural events.
• Torre di San Robert. Built by Count Paolo Ballada di San Robert, the tower stands at the top of the Parco della Rimembranza and still functions as a lookout over the surrounding hills.

How to get to Castagnole delle Lanze

It has its own railway station. Turin is about 1 h 12 min away by road. The full route from Turin.

Everything we know about Castagnole delle Lanze