Baita 1697

Chalets in Italy are like fairy dust, and Baita 1697 stands alone as an exquisitely designed luxury ski chalet in Italy’s Piedmontese Alps. It also comes with unbeatable celebrity credentials - Jamie Oliver has stayed and said it was his best chalet experience ever.

The chalet, which has been featured in Architectural Digest, was designed by interior designer Lucie McCullough. The chalet sleeps 12 adults and six children. There are five double bedrooms with full en suites plus a children’s dorm that shares the bathroom with one of the doubles and a library that turns into a double bedroom and also shares a bathroom.

The lodge has a huge open plan living and dining area under cosy exposed 17th century stone vaults, divided by a glass staircase with a giant waterfall of lights descending from the second floor.

Everywhere there is deep style — sheepskin-adorned perspex chairs sit around a handmade fold-out wooden table in the dining area, while the kitchen table is a huge root from the local national park with a glass sheet on top. This sits under a 400-year-old wooden and stone ceiling, and there is a super-modern high gloss, white lacquer cabinet and rough plastered walls, typically mixing the old with new and traditional with modern.

Baita 1697 is a fully catered, Bianca and Pietro are the cooks. They cook honest Italian food and some authentic Asian dishes. They are also complete wine lovers and are educated to sommelier standard, so there is an extensive wine list including excellent house wines and anything can be arranged in advance.

There is an outdoor wooden hot tub on the roof terrace that seats eight people and has a stunning view over Monte Banchetta. This luxury chalet also has trained osteopaths, massage therapists and physiotherapists on hand.

The Milky Way, or Via Lattea, straddles France and Italy and consists of six separate ski resorts offering something for everyone. It embraces 400km of combined slopes, and Sestriere is the highest resort at 2035m. It was in fact Europe’s first purpose-built resort and has excellent snow-making, as well as being high and the best base for exploring the Milky Way.

Italian ski resorts are the place to be for non-skiers, given the Italians’ love of relaxing and watching the world go by. There are plenty of excellent restaurants and bars to sit at, as well as smart shops to check out up in Sestriere. Sestriere also has a sports centre and pool as well as fitness centre and ice rink, and you can easily do day trips to Turin just 100km away.