Here under Florence, you will find travel information as well as general information about Florence, the city of of romance, birthplace of the renaissance.
Palazzo Vecchio - Dominated by its belfry tower, this fortress conceals treasures of decorative refinement. The courtyard, designed by Michelozzo (1470), decorated with stucco work and frescoes by Vasari and commissioned for the marriage of Francesco de Medici and Jane of Austria (1565), sets the scene. Inside the fortress is a magical palace, epitomised by the small porphyry fountain standing in the middle of the cortile, surmounted by a winged genius.
The Vasari staircase leads to the first floor with its immense Hall of the Five Hundred, commissioned by Savonarola to accommodate meetings of the Republic Council which had so many members that only one third could enter at one time. When the Medici returned to power, they made it their reception and festivity hall. Decorated with frescoes relating Florence's victories over Pisa and Siena, watched over by Cosimo who, flanked with angels, observes the scene from the central coffer, the Hall gives no hint of what the adjoining room is like: the studiolo of Francesco de Medici, a keen student of alchemy, is a secluded study, as distinctively discreet as the Hall is imposing and pompous. The visit continues with the apartments of Leo X, leading to the second floor which has three main parts: the Elements Apartments with their allegoric and mythological decoration, the Eleanora of Toledo's Apartments (Cosimo's wife), in honour of women and womanly virtues, the Priors' Apartments (the admirable Lily Chamber, with its golden fleur-de-lys against a blue background covering walls and ceiling coffers and the Map Chamber with cupboards decorated with painted maps illustrating the world as it was then known).
Gallery of Offices - Where else are there so many works by the great masters of the Renaissance? The paintings are arranged in chronological order, following the evolution of pictoral (mainly Tuscan) art up to the late 17C. Gradually leaving Byzantine influences behind, three painters gave renewed vigour to Italian painting, Cimabue, Duccio and, above all, Giotto, are represented with paintings of the Madonna. The Gothic inspiration of the Siena school is symbolised by Simone Martini (the Annunciation). Paolo Uccello's Battle of San Romano leads into the abundant Renaissance period where geometrism and volumes reflect the search for perspective. The same effort can be perceived in paintings by Masaccio (his frescoes can be admired in the Brancacci chapel) and Pierro della Francesca (Cycle of the Cross of Arezzo). Pollaiolo, with his hieratic portraits, seems to take a step back. However, with Filippo Lippi and his diaphanous, intricately-draped virgins, emerges the work of Sandro Boticelli, a great source of pride for the museum, represented here by ten or so paintings, among them Primavera and the Birth of Venus. Next came the transition to the second Renaissance embodied by Leonardo da Vinci: his famous Annunciation and Adoration of the Magi pave the way to Michelangelo's (Holy Family), Raphael's (Virgin of the Goldfinch), Andrea del Sarto and Titian and his Venus of Urbino. There is also a collection of German Renaissance paintings by Dürer, Altdorfer, Cranach and Holbein, not forgetting the Portinari triptych by the Bruges painter, Hugo van der Goes. Leaving the Renaissance behind, the visit concludes with Tintoretto, Veronese, Rubens and, finally Caravaggio's Adolescent Bacchus.
Cathedral Square - The slightly confined religious centre of the city. The group of buildings form a totally different campo santo from the one in Pisa where there was sufficient room to align the monuments in perspective. Here, urban constraints meant they had to be grouped and, due to lack of space on the square, it is difficult to appreciate the play of shapes and volumes. The partly-concealed domes and campanile are best viewed from the streets leading up from the Arno or down from San Marco or the Foundlings Hospital or those from the west from Santa Maria Novella.
On the south side of the square, on the corner of Via Calzaiuoli, stands the Loggia del Bigallo, once an orphanage, with its two 14C, semicircular arches. It now houses a small museum containing a few paintings and frescoes of the period.
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Cathedral Square - The slightly confined religious centre of the city. The group of buildings form a totally different campo santo from the one in Pisa where there was sufficient room to align the monuments in perspective. Here, urban constraints meant they had to be grouped and, due to lack of space on the square, it is difficult to appreciate the play of shapes and volumes. The partly-concealed domes and campanile are best viewed from the streets leading up from the Arno or down from San Marco or the Foundlings Hospital or those from the west from Santa Maria Novella.
On the south side of the square, on the corner of Via Calzaiuoli, stands the Loggia del Bigallo, once an orphanage, with its two 14C, semicircular arches. It now houses a small museum containing a few paintings and frescoes of the period.