Why Florence, Italy makes the ideal spring break from London
If I were searching for heaven on Earth, Florence is the first place I would look. The Italian city‘s Renaissance art and architecture make my spirit soar with their otherworldly beauty, the mountainous backdrop refreshes my eyes and soul, and the food and drink? Well, a Tuscan feast is exactly what my body ordered, in this life and in the next.
I’m hardly the first person to reach such a conclusion: every European artist, musician, and writer of note seems to have beaten a trail to Tuscany. Few of these illustrious creators were more inspired by the city than the poet John Milton, however, who spent two years in and out of the “Paradise of the Gaddi”. It was in this sumptuous garden that Milton wrote part of Paradise Lost, and though the gardens have long gone, you, too, can experience something of that splendour in the Gaddis’ two surviving palaces, Palazzo Gaddi and Palazzo Arrighetti.
Together, these masterpieces of 16th century architecture comprise Florence’s finest hotel, which since summer 2024 has been called the Tivoli Palazzo Gaddi. They are protected by Italy’s General Directorate of Antiquities and Fine Arts. Surrounded by original Baroque frescoes and heraldic coats of arms, and with jaw-dropping rooftop views of the Duomo, who knows what you might be inspired to create if you check in here for a long weekend?
I vaguely plotted my tour around the city from Palazzo Gaddi’s Milton Bar, sipping on the appropriately-named Lost Paradise, a herbal digestif made by the Florentine distillery, Fermenthinks. The Historic Centre of Florence is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, protecting for the most part the 15th and 16th century city of the Medicis. You could pick up a map and stride out purposefully towards any given destination, but there’s far more pleasure to be had in being a flâneur, leisurely exploring the exact same streets along which Milton and his acquaintances – including the astronomer Galileo – would have sauntered 400 years ago. I wandered in a loop more than a line, first to the Basilica di San Lorenzo and Palazzo Medici Riccardi, then between the Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore (better known as the Duomo) and its equally iconic, marble-clad baptistry.
A long queue of tourists and pilgrims snaked across the cathedral square, the waiting time deterring me from venturing inside, so I continued on to the Palazzo Vecchio, a 13th century landmark which looks far more like a fortress than a palace. You can climb the Duomo’s cupola, but the views from the top of Palazzo Vecchio’s tower are better, because then you can see the Duomo, too. The red-orange dome takes centrestage, with swathes of terracotta rooftops around it, and the green-blue mountain ridge beyond. With my hair whipped by the chill wind but my mind completely clear, I stared out at a level of manmade beauty I cannot put into words. Florence’s cityscape is everything you imagine it would be.
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It was a short winter day and the light was already beginning to fade. I’d pre-booked a slot at the neighbouring Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence’s gargantuan art collection, intending to take full advantage of the late night opening. With a museum of this scale you would need weeks to do it justice; a few hours will give you but a taste. I took a scatter approach, darting in and out of rooms and standing, dazzled, before anything which particularly caught my eye. The firm, sculpted bodies of The Wrestlers belie their 2,000 years, though their limbs are now trapped in combat for eternity. Amongst hundreds of depictions of the Virgin Mary and the Christ child, Vanessa Beecroft’s Self-Portrait, VBSS 03 MP and Antonio Allegri’s Adoration of the Christ Child – an unexpected pairing, I appreciate – stood out on account of the intensity of the mothers’ gaze. And then, demanding utmost reverence, is Sandro Botticelli’s Birth of Venus, utterly dominating her room. The subject makes a half-hearted attempt to protect her modesty with her golden hair, but she knows as well as you do that everyone passing can’t help but stop and stare.
With my head and heart full of art, I tromped back through dark but still lively streets to Palazzo Gaddi, stomach rumbling. The hotel’s Terrae Restaurant opens out onto its Secret Garden, a place where if I had the luxury of being like Milton, I, too, would spend endless days and nights, relaxing, thinking, and capturing the resulting thoughts in poetry and prose. Having won a Michelin star for La Parolina in Trevinano, Chef Iside De Cesare has recently come to Florence, creating menus which take fortunate diners on a gastronomic journey through time and place. The dishes in her six-course tasting menu at Terrae (€120; wine pairings €80) dance across the palate with flair, hidden ingredients such as sour plum bursting out from a white cheese and basil oil amuse bouche, whilst swirls of pickled beetroot enrobe smoky-sweet cubes of fish. And if I were to need any more inspiration from Florence, Terrae’s cheese trolley is the stuff that dreams are made of. And they are happy, tremendously well-fed dreams at that.
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Sophie Ibbotson was a guest of Tivoli Palazzo Gaddi (tivolihotels.com), where rooms start from £189 per night. British Airways (britishairways.com) flies direct from London to Florence from £125 return.