It was a pleasant surprise during our last visit to Rome: the Palazzo Doria Pamphilj (pronounced Pamphili[1]) and its amazing art gallery. The Palazzo is located next to the Baroque church of San Maria in Via Lata and can be entered from the Via del Corso. A ticket to the…
A visit to the church of San Francesco can be considered the highlight of any trip to Arezzo. The church itself is not very special. It was built in the second half of the thirteenth century (ca. 1290) and acquired its present form in the Tuscan-Gothic style about one hundred…
No matter how many times I have seen it, Florence’s cathedral continues to impress me, and for many reasons. The Duomo is simply huge, with a length of some 153 metres and a nave width of 38 metres (90 metres at the crossing). It can accommodate at least 20.000 people.…
The Vallumbrosan Order is a branch of the Benedictines that was founded in the eleventh century by Saint John Gualbert (died 1073). The first church of the Vallumbrosans in Florence was built in either 1077 or 1092 (different dates are mentioned in different sources). At that time it was outside…
The Duomo of Fiesole is hardly the most elegant building in Italy. It is simple and robust, made of large blocks of tuff. The Duomo was built in the shape of a classical Roman basilica, with the apse facing southeast. Its official name is the Cattedrale di San Romolo, after…
The small town of Fiesole rises high above the much larger city of Florence in the valley. Fiesole was known as Vipsul in Etruscan times and founded perhaps as early as 700 BCE. Situated on a hill at a height of some 300 metres, it was easy to defend and…
Even before we packed our bags and drove to Italy, we knew we wanted to visit it. Sure, we were going to visit beautiful and important cities like Florence, Siena, Arezzo and even wonderful Ravenna, but we also wanted to see something “local”, a building or a work of art…