Autumn Europe Trip: Florence
When you step off the tram in central Florence and venture into her damp, narrow allies, it’s not difficult to imagine what the city’s spanning Medici family heyday was like.
The cobblestones are just as black and shiny as they were 400 years ago, licked by the rain and made even cleaner by the shopkeepers’ incessant sweeping with tiny wooden brooms.
The streets are just wide enough to accommodate a simple horseman’s cart and the sidewalks are fit for single file scampering from one destination to the next. Red butcher stalls smelling of iron display their fine carcasses of beef in cases like fine jewelers, and men in clean white aprons hack steaks off the carnage with giant cleavers in one smooth motion.
We passed a family-run pasta shop that was also reminiscent of a jewelry shop with cases draped with golden chains of homemade spaghetti, tagliatelle, and pappardelle. Fourteen karat rings of paccheri, casarecce, and orecchiette and rich heaps of emerald spinach ravioli and ruby beet tortellinis sparkled in the case. Some of the folks inside were patrons, but it seemed most of the packed shop consisted of family members, neighbors, and old friends in leather jackets and leather shoes all shooting the breeze and eventually arguing over something we figured to be football in rapid-fire Italian.
Cracked doors reveal current-day sculptors and artisans hard at work over their works of rock, clay, iron, and leather. One careful peek revealed a woman at an easel bearing a canvas almost twice as tall as she was. Florists wrestled heaping arrangements on work tables surrounded by three walls of rainbow blooms and greenery.
Our backpacks seemed to be especially heavy by the time we reached our accommodation in the true heart of the city. The more central you go, the more hubbub you have to deal with. Charming meat and floral stalls are swapped out for yet another Zara and McDonalds. All of the guidebooks tell you that if you want to experience the most of a European city it’s important to stay in their most buzzing centers, but I’ll agree to disagree even more in a city as small and walkable as Florence. I’d prefer to sleep over at a quiet flower shop and dream of being a 16th-century shop girl than have the smell of greasy fries and a view of next week’s urban trend forecast out my window.
All of that grumpy musing aside, we adored our central Florence apartment. We were on the fourth floor in an attic apartment (no lift) and the last flight of stairs felt like a spiraling castle tower stairwell with barely enough room for one person at a time and angled steps a good 12 inches apart. Our windows opened to reveal a view of the Duomo and many other important landmarks. This was an airbnb find and it had a lived-in feel suited to a city like Florence.
My favorite part of the apartment was a skylight window above the bed. There may have been American chains on the ground level threatening to break the spell, but I couldn’t help truly feeling like a princess in a tower after climbing those steps and sleeping under exposed beams older than our country watching and listening to those wonderful golfball-sized droplets of rain hit the window in the blackness of night.
We were in Florence for three nights. Our first supper was at a upscale little family restaurant. We were served by the chef’s wife, who pretended not to know English when we asked for “just water,” and instead brought us two heaping glasses of Prosecco. It was a low-frills meal like the one we’d shared in Rome where the quality of the ingredients was the showstopper. Steak, yes, but a small unpretentious one, unlike the giant T-bones you see hanging in the windows to the ultra touristy restaurants. We savored each succulent morsel, sipping Prosecco and watching the rain fall outside the door.
The Uffitzi Gallery
On our first full day, we explored the Uffizi Gallery, where impressive hallways housed statuary beneath ornate frescoed ceilings. The highlight was seeing Botticelli’s infamous Primavera painting in person—as he's my favorite Renaissance painter and I have always been drawn to that painting. I cherish my 1920s lithograph of the painting in my dining room, but witnessing the real masterpiece felt like removing a gauze layer from your eyes and being immersed in a four-dimensional theater of comedy and tragedy. Despite scholars' limited knowledge about the painting's commission, its richness with about 500 plant species and 200 flowers (130 specifically identified) captivates with no need for subtitles. I can just picture a fervent Botticelli sending his entire workshop out into the fields and forest of Tuscany to forage as many blooms as possible to bring this painting to life.
My favorite art movement is England’s 19th-century Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (PRB). This was an artistic group that was fed up with the mathematical/mechanistic approach to art that had been celebrated by the Academy since the days of Raphael and Michelangelo. They prioritized genuine ideas, attentive study to nature, and sympathizing with “what is direct and serious and heartfelt in previous art, to the exclusion of what is conventional and self-parading and learned by rote.” They wanted to produce thoroughly good art.
The PRB worshiped Sandro Botticelli for his close observation of nature and combinations of both sacred and secular imagery, and The Primavera is the perfect poster child for all of these ideals. There’s a really fascinating post I read about the Old Masters that inspire them HERE.
A few things about the painting shocked me in person, but nothing more so than its size! None of my research on this painting and prepared me for the immense span of wall that Botticelli’s brushstrokes would cover in infinite realism. The painting spans 80 by 124 inches. A standard king bed, for reference, is a mere 76 by 80 inches.
The depth and detail in the textiles were another surprise that couldn’t translate into a photograph. On a screen, they appear somewhat flat, but in person you can feel Zephyr’s breeze all around you, causing the fabrics to swirl around the figures in a much more lustrous, dimensional fashion. You can see every embroidered stitch of Flora’s gown and every strand of silk thread in the Three Grace’s chiffon gowns.
We saw The Birth of Venus, Giotto’s Madonna, Titian’s scandalous Venus, Da Vinci’s Annunciation, Caravaggio’s Medusa, and Artemisia’s gruesome Judith. I made the mistake of viewing Botticelli’s Primavera at the very beginning of our visit, so I was a bit overwhelmed by the rest of the museum. I was looking at works just as important if not more, but I wanted to go back and count the flower species at Flora’s feet, study the ornate hairstyles of the Graces, or maybe just take a nap.
I was able to pull myself together in time to fully enjoy the museum’s most unique wing: a gallery dedicated to the self-portraits of artists! I waved at the Pre-Raphelite hero, William Hunt, and another personal hero, Pan Yuliang. Alex and I both got a giggle as we saw how 600 years of artists chose to portray themselves. Some toted haughty looks of importance with exaggerated features and impressive studio backgrounds while others just looked into your soul with every emotional burden they had ever translated with oil into art.
We also got a morbid thrill from the gallery housing Niobe and her children. This collection of sculptures recounts a morose Greek myth involving Niobe and Amphion, parents to fourteen children—seven sons and seven daughters. Niobe's maternal pride led her to compare herself to Leto, who had only two children: Apollo and Artemis. In response to this audacity, Apollo and Artemis ruthlessly slew all of Niobe's children with arrows in their parents' palace.
Inside the dimly lit gallery, statues of each fleeing child are strategically spaced a few feet apart. The atmosphere is intensified by colossal stormy battle scenes adorning the walls. It's as if a Hollywood music score is resounding through the room as you witness the demise of each figure, one by one, until only Niobe remains. It's not a narrative that leaves you with warm, fuzzy feelings about life and love, but it does make you feel something deep and guttural for humanity. The curation of the room is captured extremely well in Alfred Noyes' poem, which you can find here: link to the poem.
Much like The Met, you would need several visits to The Uffitzi to fully grasp it. Some say to spend a full day there, but I don’t know how anyone could take in everything fully in that short period without their brain combusting.
We were both a bit groggy and hungry when we got out of the museum. We’d been through 783 years of conflict, wealth, sex, power, identity, industry, and religion and we needed a breather. And food! We started wandering in search of sustenance when we started noticing, while very few at first, dozens and dozens of tourists munching down on something within red and white deli paper.
I spotted a fellow English speaker biting into the mysterious confines of the paper and I decided to investigate.
“Excuse me,” I asked, mid-bite, “Where did you get THAT.”
The Brit gulped down the bite and pointed in the direction of a tremendously long line.
Never mind, I thought, but then the girl turned the wrapper towards me so I could see inside it. The most beautiful ruffled edge of bright red salami and mozzarella so soft it could hardly stay together were nestled around a layer of succulent, bright red tomato slices.
“I know what you’re thinking,” she said, “but the line moves fast and it’s worth it!”
We decided to take her word, and her half-devoured sandwich, for it and we eased into the back of the line. She was right, it did move quickly, and it was worth it! Three sandwiches were being advertised in English, but I couldn’t help noticing the smaller sign with a dozen or so other flavor combos posted up in Italian. Alex ordered what the girl was eating, and I asked the man at the counter to make me his favorite sandwich.
I was glad I did because I never would have picked eggplant and ricotta, but biting into that sandwich was almost a spiritual experience. Normally, Alex and I would have split a sandwich that size, but we devoured both sandwiches whole in minutes flat.
The natural progression would be to next visit Michelangelo's David at the Academia Museum, but I find it somewhat elitist to charge $32 to see a statue originally intended for public viewing. Instead, I opted to save my money and appreciate the two replicas of David outside, as God and Michelangelo intended. Though not as magnificent, the Bronze version atop the hill overlooking the city was particularly beautiful and well worth the climb.
Having seen Bernini's David a few days prior, I remained partial to it. Unlike Michelangelo's portrayal of a prideful, triumphant man, Bernini depicted David as an awkward shepherd boy, embodying the intensity of the moment he faced Goliath rather than the moments after.
The city’s center is home to many of the important museums, and all of the most notable churches, but my heart was drawn to the tiny dim streets, antique dealers, and sloppy eateries across the river.
We were fortunate to hit Florence in the perfect balance of cold-enough to lower tourism and warm enough to enjoy spectacular sunsets. It rained every day, but Florence is a city much like Paris that I think rain only adds embellishment to. In our pockets of sunshine, I was thankful for the warmth, but I did find myself looking forward to the next romantic downpour. Florence is not an easy city to drive in, so it’s mostly quiet. The majority of stores and restaurants don’t even have music playing. The rain acts as nature’s orchestra, adding a romantic soundtrack to your adventures and directing you to take refuge in shops and cafes you may have otherwise overlooked.
One particularly memorable downpour led us to a lofted cafe with vintage sofas, eclectic art, and shelves filled with books. Even though I can't read Italian, there's a special comfort in cradling a hot drink surrounded by rows of used books! Nestled in a loft corner, sipping from chipped china, we observed the scene—no tourists, just grubby college students on caffeine drips and digital nomads who seemed to spend more time in this cafe over their apartments.
Another favorite in this neighborhood was a little family-run gelato shop with handwritten flavor labels. The secret to good gelato is to only purchase from the shops that have their treasures covered and hidden away in metal bins that protect their creaminess and integrity from the air. Never buy gelato that is piled up in mounds in artificial vibrant shades and topped with edible decorations. This shop had unique flavor combinations such as chocolate-orange or pear as well as city staples such as ricotta or hazelnut.
Pitti Palace
Our best experience across the river, however, was at Pitti Palace, a museum complex that is home to even more treasures. Although the fashion museum was undergoing renovations, we explored the main palace, delving into more of the city's artistic wealth. While the Uffizi was enjoyable, it was crowded, limiting our time in each gallery. In the less-visited Pitti Palace, with only about six visitors, we could leisurely appreciate the art and exchange inappropriate commentaries without any grumpy looks or prodding.
While I didn’t know the names of most of the artists in this museum, we saw some of my favorite paintings from the whole trip here. I adore 18th and 19th-century portraits of women because I love to study their clothes! If you were a woman wealthy enough to have your portrait painted in those days, you could afford gowns that took hundreds if not thousands of hours to create. Artists had to possess a solid understanding of garment construction to accurately depict these elaborate dresses, which means that even today I can get a good read of how the gowns were constructed.
Another favorite from Pitti Place is a massive ballroom with ornate ceilings and at least 14 Venetian chandeliers that are as big as my car. Panels of mirrors add the illusion of a never-ending sea sparkling and dripping with crystals. We also enjoyed discovering some enormous canvases by Plinio Nomellini, and Italian Post-Impressionist/Divisionist known for his bursts of bright colors and study of light effects.
Two other museums we loved were the Opificio delle Pietre Dure, dedicated to the art of stone mosaics, and the Museo degli Innocenti, which was hosting a stunning Mucha exhibit.
We dined like the Medici on beef and potatoes in the city’s public market at night. We scavenged pastry shops in the mornings. We stopped in our tracks and gawked each time we rounded a corner that revealed a view of the marble-clad Duomo. We caught sunsets from above and slept under a glass sheet of bouncing raindrops from below.
We’d originally planned to spend five nights in Florence, and another two nights on the North Western Coast, but after visiting the Mucha exhibit, we are inspired to rearrange our schedules a bit and venture East.
Up next: Verona and taking the train through the Alps!
