Weather
-
Mostly Cloudy
6°C
-
Thu
7/1
-
Fri
8/2
-
Sat
9/1
Copyright
I-Florence by Dotflorence staff is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribuzione-Non opere derivate 2.5 Italia License.
Based on a work at www.i-florence.com
Archive for the ‘SECRET FLORENCE’ Category
The Fabio-lous Fashion of Food!
You think of Italy, you think fashion. You think of classic cuts, dark suits, bold accessories, slick heels and slim fits; you think style.
This imagery is as part of the fabric of the nation as is the cappuccino, the vespa and la pasta fresca; often combined into one stereotypical image of an immaculate businessman sauntering down a cobbled street on a brilliant red vespa, strolling into the bar opposite the office for a coffee and putting his order in for the linguini on the menu for lunch.
Another of Italy’s inherent images, projected and promoted as much on an international level as within the country itself, is of course food. An inescapable celebration in everyday life which relates to such a base human instinct and sense of pleasure that taking time to appreciate the food Italy has to offer is difficult to forgo. Try and justify the concept of a fad diet and it will very often be seen as an insult!
Villa Demidoff – Pratolino
Amongst the numerous and magnificent palaces of the sovereigns of Tuscany , that of Pratolino is acknowledged to be most worthy of the traveller’s attention.The hand of nature had prepared the elements, that of the artist had only to reduce them to shape and symmetry. These woods composed of firs, laurels, and other ever-green trees,
seemed the asylum of perpetual spring.
To provide for the pleasures of the chase and angling, the park was stocked with wild animals, and the waters were filled with fish of every species. The grottos of Pratolino are situated in that part which is exposed to the south. One certainly cannot too much admire the brilliancy of the interior decoration, which is nearly the same through them all. The wall and the vaulted roofs are ornamented with stalactites, madrepores, marine plants, corals, shells, and mother-of-pearl; and all those objects are mingled with paintings in Mosaic.
Everywhere one sees statues of marble or of bronze, which cast streams of water into basins of marble or of gilded lead. These waters, by secret passages, flow beneath the pavement, and escape into the gardens, where they are again applied to a thousand diffirent purposes. In front of the castle rises the colossal statue of the Apennines. The style is grand, and the character of the head is perf1ectly suited to the subject; his bushy temples brave the storm, and seem covered with a hoar .frost; his hair descends like icicles upon to his large shoulders, and the locles » Read more…