{"id":14351,"date":"2020-02-05T09:10:24","date_gmt":"2020-02-05T08:10:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.arttrav.com\/?p=14351"},"modified":"2020-10-22T07:47:51","modified_gmt":"2020-10-22T05:47:51","slug":"staycation-itinerary-duomo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.arttrav.com\/florence\/staycation-itinerary-duomo\/","title":{"rendered":"A Florence Staycation Itinerary within View of the Duomo"},"content":{"rendered":"

The last time I slept within Florence’s historic city walls<\/strong>, it was the summer of 1997. I was sharing a room in a very classic pensione<\/em> with three other students, each with her own nun-bed. Fast forward more than 20 years and I’ve never been a downtown dweller – by choice – which means I haven’t experienced the thrill of staying right at the heart of things in Florence. [OK there was that one time we slept on my office floor, having been locked out of the house for a broken key, but that doesn’t count as it was involuntary.] The invitation to spend a night at the newly opened Art\u00e9 Boutique Hotel<\/strong><\/a>, just steps from the Duomo, was too tempting. This is the kind of place I’d choose if I were to visit for a long weekend – small, central and eclectic.<\/p>\n

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Me in our fabulous suite | ph. Tracy Russo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As my husband and I packed a small bag for our Florence staycation, I challenged us to stay within a 500 meter radius of the hotel<\/strong>, and planned to take advantage of the proximity to cultural sites to revisit some old favourites, off-season, as well as show some to Tommaso, who hadn’t seen them since grade school. To complete the “tourist effect”, we took the bus to destination, armed with google maps to find the right building. What follows is my staycation itinerary – two days in Florence with a view of the Duomo.<\/p>\n

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This is our 500 meter radius, that goes basically from piazza San Marco to piazza della Repubblica<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Checking in to our central hotel<\/h2>\n

We enter Art\u00e9 through one of the grand doorways off via Cavour, a building that still houses some private apartments, tucked between public offices and businesses. An old lift takes us to the second floor where we enter into an alternate reality of velvety textures and perfumed calmness. Welcomed by owners Sara and Antonio<\/strong>, we’re immediately offered a drink and a chat in the lounge that features an always open snack bar with rather irresistible upmarket goodies. She’s an experienced hospitality manager, he’s an architect who manages large hotel construction projects, and this is their first hotel, built on years of criticizing others and a desire to create the perfect hospitality experience.<\/p>\n

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Every room I saw made me exclaim “this one’s my favourite”.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Off to our room, a gigantic top-floor loft suite with private Duomo view balcony<\/strong> – though we got a peek into a number of other stunningly decorated rooms on our way. Faux-architectural wallpaper, art-deco style custom furniture and jewel-tone velvets are the order of the day, and the bane of the cleaning staff’s existence – they spend half their time brushing the velvet that shows every imprint. With each room unique in both decoration and layout, the hotel’s website allows you to pick the specific room you want.<\/p>\n

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The couch is perfectly placed for Duomo-vision<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Antonio, who is actually Spanish, knows I’m into art so he takes out a roll of what appear to be blueprints that he reserves for special guests “who seem to want to go beyond the surface.” On tracing paper as well as transparent acetate are a series of sketches of Brunelleschi’s Dome<\/strong>, with numbers and formulas annotated in the margins. “These are just my first drawings,” explains Antonio, saying he hopes to codify this little “speech” of his. Looking through the window and concentrating on his lines, he speaks with rare enthusiasm about the miraculous way that Brunelleschi developed the Dome, and I learn about the pointed fifth arch<\/strong>, an architectural term I didn’t know before. Hear his story about the Dome in this video below.<\/p>\n