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Casa Guidi, poet Elizabeth Barrett´s home in Florence
Art & Culture

Casa Guidi, poet Elizabeth Barrett´s home in Florence

14 enero, 2026 / By:
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Visiting a house-museum always embraces a closer emotional approach to the artist who lived there than just simply observe the works displayed in the neutral and dehumanized rooms of a museum. Casa Guidi was the Florentine residence of poets Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning for the most part of their married life. Located in the heart of Florence, the apartment has elegant main chambers with an 18th century decoration style and essentially maintains the same furniture that in the Brownings´ age. They resided here for fourteen years, between 1847 and 1861, and these interiors served as inspiration for some of their greatest poems, like Casa Guidi Windows (Elizabeth Barrett, 1851), inspired by her struggle for freedom.…

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Cloisters of Florence: the great scape
Art & Culture

Cloisters of Florence: the great scape

13 enero, 2026 / By:
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Florence does not stand as a vulgar Renaissance theme park, but rather as an infinite source of beauty and art, an open-air museum in which emotions grow by every minute. As I walk through the cloisters of Santa Maria Novella, San Lorenzo, San Marcos, Santa Croce or Santo Spirito, peace and solitude seem very tangible to me. However, what most hypnotizes me is rather more radical. In these religious courtyards, with their gallery portrayed on all four sides, it is easy to feel as if you had left this world, not minding at all how to return, while you are busy imagining your next sins and who will be part of them.…

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Not a home but your home
Moments & People

Not a home but your home

18 noviembre, 2025 / By:
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I am here a few months per year to please my voracious curiosity, searching meanwhile for some luck. The coexistence of different historic periods gives Florence a certain air of timelessness. Thus, I walk through these foreign streets as if my ancestors had left their trail in establishments and sidewalks; as if this is the home to which one always wishes to return. To my astonishment, I have discovered I feel at home in Florence. I especially sensed it through the intense joy, or rather euphoria, felt at the time of arrival. Also through the sadness, almost depression, lived at the moment of departure. Next comes the longing for the piercing song of the starlings and the tolling of the bells, as opposite to the exhausting sirens of police, ambulances and the squeaking rattle of the Berlin tram.…

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Firenze-SMN central station: arriving alone in a foreign country
Moments & People

Firenze-SMN central station: arriving alone in a foreign country

16 noviembre, 2025 / By:
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I love the Florence-Santa Maria Novella train station for many reasons. For instance, its loudspeaker announcing the arrival of the Milan train by the binario otto and the departure to Venice by the binario due, or the smell of the railway machinery and, naturally, because of those who travel to other places. It is also wonderful to arrive alone in a foreign country, feeling the assault of transformation. The Italians are still here, busy living. The rhythm of their lives is different, while I am a complete stranger, an eccentric or maybe not. A friend has recently told me: «You are acquiring a past in Florence.» That´s an assertion — without going into grim details — I find not very encouraging, nonetheless quite revealing. Because, above all, I love to attraversare il binario ed oltrepassare la linea gialla.…

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Medici villas #2: Poggio a Caiano
Medici Traces

Medici villas #2: Poggio a Caiano

16 noviembre, 2025 / By:
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The construction of this medicean villa located between Florence, Prato and Pistoia was the whim of Lorenzo the Magnificent, thus he commissioned it to his favourite architect, Giuliano da Sangallo, at the end of the 15th century. A residence for the pure leisureliness of contemplation by the dynastic power, the villa of Poggio a Caiano recovers elements of the classic architecture such as the fronton and Ionic temple at the main facade. Due to the harmony and symmetry of its proportions, as for representing an ideal of life in the outskirts under Humanism, the site is listed World Heritage by the UNESCO since 2013. Walking the Parco all’inglese and the Giardino all’italiana is as stimulating as visiting its interior. Free entrance.
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Being an expat in Florence
Moments & People

Being an expat in Florence

15 noviembre, 2025 / By:
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Meeting a foreign resident in Florence makes me wonder: “What brought him here?” (love, work, despair, art heritage, studies, food, wine, people, indecision), what moved him to stay here, what do I have in common with this person (at first and apparently quite a lot, and sometimes, in reality, nothing). However, what differentiates us, I sure know. It is usually, with natural exceptions, the routine. My discontinuous / intermittent stays in Florence let me enjoy the city with a renewed intensity each time. Such joy, I am afraid, might become ruined when choosing a permanent residence.
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Medici villas #3: Medicean villa di Castello – Accademia della Crusca
Medici Traces

Medici villas #3: Medicean villa di Castello – Accademia della Crusca

14 noviembre, 2025 / By:
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Like the villa of La Petraia, the villa medicea di Castello is in the hills of Castello, a few kilometres from Florence. Built in the 14th century and completely rebuilt in the 16th century, it is mostly famous for its gardens, which compete in splendour with those of Boboli. Also known as Villa Reale, L’Olmo or Il Vivaio, di Castello serves currently as the headquarters of the Accademia della Crusca, Italy’s most prestigious linguistic institution, so the visits are restricted and always subject to prior request. The gardens under management of the Polo Museale di Firenze, the institution in charge of the public museums of the province of Florence, are however more accessible. In addition to the gardens, another must-see is its library, the largest in the country regarding linguistics and history of the Italian language.
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Florence literary walk
Outdoors

Florence literary walk

23 octubre, 2025 / By:
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Searching for the ideal of beauty in all its artistic manifestations or for an oasis to feel safe from hostility, artists, writers, architects, filmmakers, designers, historians and intellectuals, in general, had historically made of Florence their home. In just one hour, it is possible to discover all the places where some of the most outstanding writers of recent times lived.…

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Tabernacles: religious street art in Florence
Outdoors

Tabernacles: religious street art in Florence

2 octubre, 2025 / By:
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There is no doubt that the tabernacles are a key element of the oldest streets of Florence. More than a religious character, it seems to me that they have quite an exquisite kitsch appearance. The city currently houses around 1200 tabernacles, of different styles and periods — some are true masterpieces. Catholics fought against heresy not only with preaching, but also by placing sacred images on the streets, houses, shops and public buildings which endure today. In Oltrarno there is still a large number of these particular street sanctuaries, available for a worldly prayer at any time of the day or night. The ancient Romans were already devotees of this form of religious architecture, for they built small temples in the streets with sacred images that protected both the house and the travelers.
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Galleria Frilli, the legendary studio and sculpture gallery of Florence
Fashion & Shops & Markets

Galleria Frilli, the legendary studio and sculpture gallery of Florence

30 septiembre, 2025 / By:
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Founded in 1860, the family run Gallery-Studio Frilli quickly achieved international recognition for its marble replicas of classical, Renaissance and neoclassical sculptures. Indeed, walking through its comfortable rooms one feels in a Renaissance theme park. The sculptures seem just about to talk. Conceived with the purpose of decorating ostentatious residences in Europe, America and Asia, Frilli has the largest collection of models derived directly from the original pieces, museums and monuments from the Western world. That is why the works are considered real replicas and not mere copies. The family also created the bronze replicas at Lorenzo Ghiberti´s Gates of Paradise in the baptistery of Florence. Perfect for an LSD trip.
Galleria Frilli -Via dei Fossi, 26, 50123 Florence FI 
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