The property is located in the municipality of Orselina, which lies above Locarno on a hillside overlooking Lake Maggiore. The municipality owes its insubric climate, mild and dry in winter, moderately warm in summer, to the lake, which allows a lush Mediterranean and subtropical flora to grow outdoors. With more than 2100 hours of sunshine a year, as measurements by the nearby Locarno-Monti Meteorological Institute have shown, the Locarno hill area is the region with the most sunshine in all of Switzerland. The municipality covers about 2 square kilometres and has 750 inhabitants. Orselina is known for the pilgrimage church “Madonna del Sasso” and, since 2000, for the aerial cableway to Cardada, built by the famous architect Mario Botta.