Visit Florence Guide & Florence Tourism
Visit Florence Guide & Florence Tourism
Florence Guides & Florence Attractions
Guide to Florence, Italy
Florence is one of the best-known cities of the world.
For many years been the cradle of culture and art. In Florence were born or worked on, many of the greatest artists of the Renaissance and the history of mankind.
Top views of Florence is superb, beautiful, almost asleep by the time.
Incredibly rich in history and culture, the city immediately catches the imagination of its visitors, with the streets overlooked by the imposing palaces, the alleys, the slow flow of the river Arno, the crowded streets and major museums. Florence should be lived with passion to be understood, can not and should not be viewed as if it were a parade of postcards, one of the many tours that you claim to know the city in just 20 minutes or so. We are facing a precious jewel that everyone envies, take some ‘time, it is worth it.
Surrounded by the hills of Settignano, Fiesole, Careggi, Arcetri and Bellosguardo, the city today lives mainly on tourism, although it has other economic activities such as industries like textiles, optics, pharmaceutical, and a decent crafts (embroidery, jewelery, made from straw and production of leather goods). Seat of a famous and historic University, Florence is now synonymous with research and science, with the development of two important areas, the Polo Scientifico in Sesto Fiorentino and the National Research Council, and many historical and also numerous libraries and institutions ‘prestigious higher education.
The historic Florence is included in a fairly compact, so that the main sights can be reached on foot. Piazza del Duomo is still the most representative of its center, an ideal starting point for a visit to the city. Florence, cradle of the Italian Renaissance, the political, economic and cultural center was the most important city in Europe for over two centuries, from 1300 to 1550. They were the Florentines to have reinvented the “money” – in the shape of the gold florin – and Florence was the engine that drove Europe out of the dark period of the Middle Ages. It was the Florentine bankers, in those centuries lucky, to partially finance the economic development of half of Europe, from Britain to Bruges, in Lyon, central eastern Europe.
While most of the city still has a Renaissance look, the area between the Palazzo Vecchio and the Duomo in the tourist projects typically medieval atmosphere. For centuries, along with Piazza della Signoria, these were the real heart of the political and social life of the city. The value of the artistic heritage of Florence is invaluable, among elegant Renaissance palaces, the Ponte Vecchio (survived the bombings of World War II) magnificent basilicas and churches, but the city remains perhaps the most popular attractions on display in art museums, academies and in many churches.
From Botticelli to Michelangelo, Florence is the undisputed home of Art. And it is also for its museums: the Uffizi Gallery, Palazzo Pitti, the Bargello Palace, the Archaeological Museum, the Museum of Modern Art, the Museum Opera del Duomo; libraries: Laurentian, Riccardi, Marucelliana , National Central; academies: the bran, Cimento, Colombaria and last but not least, the gardens: the gigantic and monumental Boboli Gardens, an open-air museum and the city park, the Stables, a place beloved by those who make sport and picturesque setting for many shows in the summer.
The religious monuments are a major arts complex: the Duomo (Santa Maria del Fiore), surmounted by the immense dome of Brunelleschi and Giotto’s Bell Tower, which houses a Pietà by Michelangelo, the Baptistery with its bronze doors of Ghiberti and Andrea Pisano , Santa Maria Novella, Santa Croce, where the tombs of the great Italians such as Machiavelli, Michelangelo, Galileo, Foscolo, Rossini, and how not to mention the church of San Lorenzo with the vestries of Brunelleschi (old) and Michelangelo (new ).
The civil architecture was also expressed in works great, just to name a few: Palazzo Vecchio, the Loggia of Orcagna, the Spedale degli Innocenti (Brunelleschi) with an elegant portico, the Medici palaces, Palazzo Pitti (picture gallery) the Uffizi Gallery (by Vasari) and the Old Bridge, distinctive for its double row of exclusive shops of goldsmiths (XVI century).
