Palazzo Vecchio had always been the place where the governors ruled the city, the heart of the public life of Florence. Still today it houses the major of Firenze and several city offices.
The building is magnificent, in a characteristic tuscan gothic style, the architect was Arnolfo di Cambio, the same of Santa Maria del Fiore cathedral and Santa Croce who started the construction in1299. the façade is so elegant, made of solid rustic stonework, with its crenellated battlement supported by small arches and corbels.
The tower is placed in an asymmetrical position because Arnolfo di Cambio incorporated the ancient tower of the Foraboschi family in the new tower. The tower is named Tower of Arnolfo, to remember its great brilliant designer (he's my favorite architect ever!)

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The Palazzo dei Vicari in Scarperia was built in the early XIV century and it’s a wonderful public palace, still with elements of a military building and a high tower that makes it look a bit like Palazzo Vecchio in Florence.

On the façade are placed several coats of arms, one for every vicario (a sort of ancient major of the city) that ruled over Scarperia and the Mugello area. Some of this coats of arms are precious masterpieces of Della Robbia and Benedetto Buglioni.
The inner court is wonderful, with fresco paintings representing religious scenes and other coats of arms.

Inside the palace there’s the Museum of Cutting Tools, an exhibition that shows the ancient art of Scarperia, the production of handmade knives.

You can see the tour of my daytrip in Mugello in this post :-)

the ancient water well of Palazzo dei Vicari

coats of arms inside Palazzo dei Vicari, Scarperia

frescos inside Palazzo dei Vicari

the inner court of Palazzo dei Vicari, Scarperia

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This Medici villa is located in the nearbies of Florence, in the Mugello region, a wonderful corner of quiet tuscan countryside.
Villa del Trebbio is really ancient, but in 1428 Cosimo de’ Medici completely renovated and enlarged it; the architect is Michelozzo (the same of Cafaggiolo and Palazzo Medici).
This villa was surrounded by forests and agricultural estate, and even if it looks like a fortified castle, it was a place of pleasure and rest for the Medici family. Today the castle is surrounded by a beautiful cypress wood with more than one century old trees.
Unfortunately today this villa is private, and visits can be booked just in some special occasions.

You can see the tour of my daytrip in Mugello in this post!

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The next stop of my trip in Mugello was the castle of Cafaggiolo, one of the most ancient of the Medici villas.
It was originally a military building in order to defend the area. In 1428 was restructured by Michelozzo, on assignment of Cosimo the Old. Michelozzo changed the fortress into a delightful villa for restoring vacations of the Medici family, especially in the summer, but the villa still has the typical aspect of a military castle.
Lorenzo il Magnifico spent his summer here in Cafaggiolo when he was a boy, and always loved this place in a special way.
When I’ve been there unfortunately the villa was closed because of restorations, so I just could admire it from the outside, but it worth anyway, the villa is so beautiful…
To reach the castle of Cafaggiolo reach San Piero a Sieve, and follow the signs to Barberino nel Mugello, you’ll soon see the villa on your left.


You can see the tour of my daytrip in Mugello in this post :-)

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Yesterday I went to Palazzo Strozzi to see the temporary exhibition of contemporary art that is placed in the inner court of the building.
The court is a perfect example of renaissance love for geometry, and is a wonderful frame for contemporary installations of art.
Currently Palazzo Strozzi is also hosting a very interesting exhibition dedicated to Galileo Galilei and the graphic representation of the universe from the classic era to the telescope innovation. ( for more info check the official Palazzo Strozzi Website). http://www.palazzostrozzi.org/

Here are the pictures I took yesterday in the evening!

the inner court of Palazzo Strozzi

the installation of contemporary art in the inner court of Palazzo Strozzi

facade of Palazzo Strozzi

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Yesterday I went to Villa Stibbert to enjoy a walk in the park and to visit the museum... I didn't know how nice and interesting it was until my friend Daniela took me there! Thank you Dany :-)

The villa was once Stibbert's home, and has 57 rooms that exhibit all of Stibbert's collections from all around the world. Frederick Stibbert was a rich heir born in 1836 and grown in England, but lately moved to Florence. He had no need to work so he lived his life collecting objects and turned his house into a museum.

Paintings are displayed throughout every room, including still lifes and portraits. There is also collections of valuable furniture, porcelains, Tuscan crucifixes, Etruscan artifacts, and an outfit worn by Napoleon I.

Sure the most interesting exhibition is the Stibbert's Arms and Armour collection: more of 12.000 pieces of arms and armour from the 15th trough the 19th century, from all over the world: European, Oriental, Japanese, Arab pieces.

In the Cavalcade Room you can admire a large collection of medieval knights on horseback and foot-soldiers dressed with original armours and holding their weapons… that’s impressive! In the Samurai Room there are more than 80 armours and hundreds of swords.

Outside the museum, over the walls of the villa, there is a large collection of stone coats of arms from the most important nobile families from all over Europe.
The museum also contains a small cafe and a bookstore.

The garden of the villa is pretty interesting too, it’s a nice English garden full of strange things and historical quotes, as it was very popular and appreciated in the second half of 1800.
Walking around the park you can find a nice small temple in classical style, with a dome covered with coloured pieces of ceramic, some ponds, a lot of wild vegetation, an elegant “limonaia” (typical rural building used to recover citrus plants like lemons), and even an odd small neo-egyptian temple built on an island in the main pond, with sphinxes, pharaoh statues and a small obelisk.
The paths are curvy and quite wild, and are dotted with statues.
It’s a very curious garden, full of odd things that play with history, geography and cultural quotes, a perfect example of the 800esque ideas of Sublime and Beautiful, typical of Picturesque.

the classical small temple in Stibbert Garden, Florence.

a nice classical terrace in front of Stibbert villa
the limonaia of Stibbert Villa with a wonderful lemon tree in a pot

the weird neo-egyptian temple in the Stibbert Garden in Florence

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The gallery is second only to the Uffizi in importance, and is notable for the works of Rubens, Pietro da Cortona, Tiziano e Raffaello (Titian and Raphael).

Begun in 1458 from an original design by Brunelleschi, the architecture of Palazzo Pitti was inspired by ancient Roman buildings. An enormous affair, it was built for Luca Pitti, a one time friend of the Medici who became jealous of their power and turned against them. The palace was a blatant attempt at one-upmanship, but the fortunes of the Pitti family soon faded, and the powerful Medici family acquired the building, still uncompleted, in 1540.

It was to become the family seat in Florence and it was Cosimo´s wife, Eleanor of Toledo (whose dowry paid for the purchase), who was to transform the hillside behind the palace into the Boboli garden.

Palazzo Pitti remained the principal Medici residence until the last male Medici heir died in 1737: the Medici dynasty became extinct and the palace passed to the new Grand Dukes of Tuscany, the Austrian House of Lorraine.

The palace is home to eight separate museums: Galleria Palatina (Palatine Gallery, probably the most important one), begun by Cosimo de’ Medici the second in 1620; Gallery of Modern Art; Costume Gallery; Museo degli argenti (Silver Museum); Porcelain Museum; Boboli Garden.

Opening hours:

Open Tuesday to Sunday 8,15 – 18,50

Closed Monday, New Year’s Day, May 1st and Christmas Day.

Tickets:
Full Price: € 6,50Reduced: € 3,25
Free admission for people under 18 or over 65, students and teachers of faculties of architecture, cultural heritage conservation, educational sciences, or of Fine Arts Academy, tour guides.

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To see my pictures of Piazzale degli Uffizi, please read this post :-)

This is probably the most famous museum in the world. Its collection of Primitive and Renaissance paintings comprises several universally acclaimed masterpieces of all time, including works by Giotto, Simone Martini, Piero della Francesca, Fra Beato Angelico, Lippi, Botticelli, Mantegna, Correggio, Leonardo da Vinci, Raffaelo, Michelangelo and Caravaggio. The German, Dutch and Flemish masters are also present in the Uffizi museum with important paintings by Dürer, Rembrandt and Rubens.

The Uffizi Gallery is located on the upper floor of the big building planned by Giorgio Vasari from 1560, which housed the administrative offices of the Tuscan State. The Gallery was created by Francesco I, and then enriched and enlarged by other members of the Medici family, who were great collectors of paintings, sculpture and arts in general. The collection was then rearranged and enlarged by the Lorraine Grand-dukes, who succeeded the Medici family, and finally by the Italian State.

The building also houses other relevant collections: the Contini Bonacossi Collection and the Collection of Prints and Drawings (Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe degli Uffizi).The Vasari Corridor, the raised passageway connecting the Uffizi with Pitti Palace, was also built by Giorgio Vasari in 1565: the Corridor is hung with an important collection of 17th-century paintings and the famous collection of self-portraits of artists.

Tickets:
Full price 6,50 €
Reduced 3,25 €
Free admission for people under 18 or over 65, students and teachers of faculties of architecture, cultural heritage conservation, educational sciences, or of Fine Arts Academy, tour guides.

Opening hours:
Open Tuesday to Sunday 8,15 – 18,50Closed Monday, New Year’s Day, May 1st and Christmas Day.
For Booking: +39(055) 294883
Booking charge: 4 €

Double Portrait of Federico da Montefeltro and his wife, by Piero della Francesca

Self-Portrait, by Raphael

The Head of Medusa, by Caravaggio

The Birth of Venus, by Botticelli

Bacchus, by Caravaggio

Here are two nice videos that I found on Youtube which show the Uffizi tour :-)

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Palazzo Strozzi has been built during a long time and various architects planned it: the result is an harmonic and perfect example of reinassance palace, the most regular, homogenous and symmetrical one, in a time which the symmetry and the regularity of shapes were very appreciated gifts. This palace was the house of the Strozzi family, an important dynasty of rich florentine bankers, who built this magnificent building to demonstrate its own wealth, to use it as personal residence, but also for its own transactions and businesses.

The private house is placed on the two superior plans, while on the ground floor, around the inner court, there were shops and banks: the court was opened the public and it was shaped like a real public city square, an extension in the private space of the public city.

Externally the Palace is solid and compact: a facade in solid stone, with a “bugnato” surface with large sketched blocks, with regular windows, diversified for level: square small and to the ground floor, double lancet windows closed in an arc to the superior floors.
Even in the inner court, in the rooms and in the plant, we can see the perfect symmetry.
The inner court is just so beautiful, it’s easy to imagine it full of people busy with business in their daily lives, walking in the rooms and stepping up the big elegant stairs.

Today Strozzi Palace is an important museum with international expositions of paintings sculptures, architecture, which periodically change.
The Palace is in the historical centre of Florence, easily reachable by bus or with a 5 minutes walk from Santa Maria Novella Station.

Palazzo Strozzi

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