Hello

Hello! I’m Amber, I am a cook and author living between Wiltshire and Tuscany. Seven years ago I co-founded the @arnianopaintingschool , residential painting holidays which I started with my dear friend and supremely talented painter @willropercurzon . I cook and Will teaches our guests to paint at Arniano, the house I grew up in in southern Tuscany and where my (English) family lived full time until I was thirteen - when my parents realised that my sister and I couldn’t read or write in English, only Italian. We’ve always been very much back and forth, but five years ago my husband - freelance journalist @matthewbellglobal - and I decided to move to Florence full time, and we’ve been here ever since: cooking, writing and hosting painting retreats with Will. Now we split our time between Italy and the UK, and offer painting retreats in a variety of places including Pylewell Park, Will’s family home in Hampshire, and as of 2022 in Provence.
I was taught to cook by my mum @camillaguinness an interior designer and famed home cook. Over the years, since I was a child and my mum would cook for friends, and more recently on the painting courses, meals have always been accompanied by cries of “HOW do you make this?”, “what’s the recipe”, and “you should write a book”. Over lockdown that’s what I did. With the help of @robynleaphotography @kirsten_abbott and the whole wonderful team at @thamesandhudsonau It’s been a long old road with all the hurdles thrown at us by the pandemic, but I’m so happy and proud to say - we did it! And I am so excited that I am now able to share the cover and release date with you all. On this site there will be a few recipes, travel snippets and observations from our Tuscan life. I hope you enjoy it. Ax

This photo is an outtake from a shoot with the talented @labnoon who took some fabulous spring shots for my book to supplement principal photographer and creative director Robyn Lea’s glorious photographs.