Alma-Via Guesthouse is a traditional, Saxon-style farmhouse that has been converted into a Guesthouse & Restaurant. The property is located right in the heart of Transylvania with many cultural sites and medieval attractions and cities within easy reach.
The Guesthouse has six wonderful, different guestrooms to fulfill all your needs. For bigger groups that need more than six rooms, we will gladly assist you in finding additional accommodation in Alma Vii.
At the heart of our services is our Restaurant barn. After all, what would a stay at a guesthouse be without good food in a nice setting? Please be aware that you need to reserve your table in the restaurant in advance.
Over the years, Alma-Via Guesthouse has become a lively place
Our guests are coming from all over the world. The biggest group is Romanian guests, usually from bigger cities. Often, guests are coming back bringing their friends with them as well.
Sometimes bicycle tour groups stay at our place.
From time to time we also have horse riders staying which park their horses in our garden overnight.
Weddings and baptisms are being celebrated at Alma-Via Guesthouse just as corporate events and workshops.
2022 was the third year the art publishing house had a week-long workshop for young writers at our place. Here, a selected group of young kids learn to write and illustrate books. The workshop has been led by 2018 Thomas Mann price winner Mircea Cărtărescu and his wife Ioana Nicolaie.
Contact us to discuss your stay or event
If you would like to stay at our place as well we would like to invite you to book your stay or contact us with any questions you might have.
Hope to see you soon!
We created the guesthouse we always were looking for
The birth of Alma-Via Guesthouse
We are not related to any Transylvanian Saxons. And our previous work in corporate jobs was no indication that we would end up doing what we did. Here is some more background for you to understand why we created the Alma-Via Guesthouse in its current form.
Background: two years of Romanian photo-safaris
When my ex-company sent me to work in Bucharest for a few weeks, Marion and I used the weekends to discover exciting and beautiful places in Romania. Before that time, I barely knew where Romania was.
Weeks turned into months and months turned into two years. In the end, we had done several weekend workshops with professional photographers like our friend Mihai Moiceanu and with Sorin Onisor.
We really enjoyed Romania, but we had to move on
The following 6 years we spent working in Budapest, Hungary. At the same time, we were always drawn back to beautiful Romania. When we decided to leave our corporate jobs and create something as a family, we decided to move to Transylvania permanently.
Our travels inside Romania had left us with the impression that there was still some room for the guesthouse we envisioned. So we went ahead and created the guesthouse we always were looking for.
Finding the right spot for Alma-Via Guesthouse was a challenge
Our requirement list was short and easy. We were looking for a place that
- is an end-of-the-road village (silent without much traffic)
- has a fortified church
- has friendly people that greet you even if you are a stranger
- a fitting property somebody would sell to us
We found all of this in the village of Alma Vii, 15km south of Mediaș.
The building and restoration phase took three years
As this time was so central to the Alma-Via Guesthouse story, we have a special website section dedicated to this topic. Here, we would like to just briefly focus on some material choices we have done.
A focus on natural insulation materials
During the restoration phase, we made many decisions focusing on the creation of a healthy room climate.
- Ecological wall insulation in all guestrooms. All outside-facing walls were insulated with straw and clay. This helps the walls with their natural humidity exchange and creates good room climates.
- A complete refusal to use any industrial construction foam. Instead, all heat insulation around windows and doors, etc. have been done with hemp and clay. This is especially visible in the Restaurant Barn where big areas around wooden supports are covered with clay.
- Sound insulation has been done with “Isofloc”. This is loose-fill cellulose insulation made from recycled newspaper. Blown into the gap between ceiling beams and Floor beams, sounds are reduced effectively.
The finished guestrooms are equipped with comfortable beds and nice bathrooms
If you want to know more about the final furnishing of our Guestrooms, we would like to point you toward our Guestroom Overview page.
The Restaurant barn has become a multipurpose building
Of course, the focus is still on tasty food. But the barn can take on different roles for different occasions. Why don’t you check out the Restaurant / Event Barn overview we have here?
The garden is going through constant transformations
We have worked hard to bring electricity, light, internet, and water to all corners of the garden.
Maybe you are interested to learn more about our natural swimming pond? Check it out here.