Return times and again and there will be always something more to discover in Florence. Just coming back to one place in a different time around the clock, the light, the mood, the people and the view will be different.
Small in size, but enormous on Europe’s bucket list, a real Renaissance treasure chest: top world class art, towers and places evoke thousands tales from over thousand years of history. Cradle of Renaissance, home of Michelangelo and Machiavelli, and … the Medici. Florence is magnetic, completely luring, romantic, brilliant and unfogettable.
Florence is Medici, the bankers to the Holy See, who took the lion’s share in the city’s government first as de facto rulers of the Florentine Republic, later taking charge turning it into Grand Duchy of Tuscany, especially after Siena fell to Florence. Ruthless in achieving their aims, merciless to their plotting rivals, generous patrons, having eyes for talent, the Medici family encouraged art, music and poetry, turning Florence into Italy’s cultural capital, where the Renaissance art, sculpture and architecture reached its zenith.
We owe an enormous gratitude to the last Medici – Anna Maria Luisa, patroness of art in her own right. She bequeathed the family’s vast art collection, including the contents of the Uffizi, palaces and Medicean villas, which she inherited upon her brother’s death as well as her personal treasures to the Tuscan state on the condition that no part of it would be removed.