Open day of the villas and gardens in Florence 24 May 2026

Those of you who are enthusiasts for the villas and gardens of Tuscany have a great opportunity on Sunday 24 May 2026 to visit a great many of the villas and gardens that are usually closed to the public. Entrance is free. I can't emphasise enough what a wonderful opportunity this is to see some splendid architecture and historical gardens.

Palazzo Corsini and its garden in Florence

Open gardens in the Florence historical centre – opening hours 10 am to 1 pm – 3 pm to 7 pm. Sunday 24 May 2026. 

Giardino Torrigiani in Florence

San Francesco di Paola Garden, piazza San Francesco di Paola 3

Giardino Torrigiani, via dei Serragli 144

Palazzo Ricasoli Firidolfi (no reservation required), via Maggio 7

Palazzo Antinori di Brindisi Aldobrandini (no reservation required), via dei Serragli 9

Palazzo Frescobaldi (no reservation required), via Santo Spirito 11

Antica Torre Terrace (Fiesole Music School concert, 11 pm), via Tornabuoni 1

Palazzo Bartolini Salimbeni (no reservation required), piazza Santa Trinita 1

Palazzo Corsini (no reservation required), lungarno Corsini 10

Palazzo Rucellai (no reservation required), via della Vigna Nuova 18

Palazzo Antinori, piazza Antinori 3

Palazzo Gondi, via dei Gondi 2 and piazza San Firenze 1

Antellesi Garden (no reservation required), piazza Santa Croce 21

Fondazione Mello – Le Colonne Art Studio, borgo Pinti 24

Palazzo Leopardi – Marcello Tommasi Art Studio, via della Pergola 57

Palazzo Ximenes Panciatichi (Fiesole Music School concert, 3 pm), Borgo Pinti 68

Palazzo Grifoni Budini Gattai (Fiesole Music School concert, 4 pm), piazza Santissima Annunziata 1

Palazzo Niccolini (Fiesole Music School concert, 12pm, no reservation required), via dei Servi 15

Palazzo Pucci, via de’ Pucci 4

Palazzo Ginori (Fiesole Music School concert, 5 pm), via de’ Ginori 11

Read my post on the Florence open day gardens I visited in 2015. 

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Holiday accommodations in Chianti

Author: Anna Maria Baldini

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Il Palazzo di Bianca Cappello in the Oltrarno of Florence, Tuscany

Il Palazzo di Bianca Cappello

During the first half of the 15 C, at Via Maggio 26, in the Oltrarno area of Florence, there was a palazzo belonging to the Corbinelli family, purchased in 1566 by Piero Buonaventuri, husband of the Venetian noblewoman Bianca Cappello. This palazzo was a setting of one of the most talked about love stories of the Renaissance, that between Bianca Cappello and Grand Duke Francesco de' Medici, son of Cosimo de' Medici. During the period in which they were still clandestine lovers, to meet secretly, Bianca and Francesco used an underground passage that starts from the cellars of the palazzo and reaches the Palazzo Pitti, a block away. During World War II, numerous art works from the Vasari corridor were stored in the passage for safekeeping. Today the passage is no longer passable.

 Bianca Cappello

After Bianca was widowed, she was able to modernise and embellish her palazzo under the supervision of Bernardo Buontalenti and with financial support from Francesco. The façade was renovated with rich graffito decoration created by Bernardino Poccetti.

On 12 October 1579, Francesco I de’ Medici and Bianca Cappello married for the second time amongst great celebrations, despite the hostility of the Medici family. The ceremony between the Grand Duke and the "Daughter of Venice" followed the one that had taken place secretly in June of the same year.
After the wedding, Bianca donated the palazzo to the Hospital of Santa Maria Nuova and subsequently the grotesques were painted on the façade.

Grand Duke Francesco I de' Medici

This story remains intriguing right up until the present day, not least because of the tragic deaths of both Bianca and Francesco, within 24 hours of one another, at the Medici villa of Poggio a Caiano under suspicious circumstances that have never been clarified.

More about Francesco I de’ Medici and Bianca Cappello.

More about the Villas and palazzi of Tuscany.

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Author: Anna Maria Baldini

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Things to see in Lucca

Last Saturday, when temperatures were down slightly, I paid a visit to Lucca, that lovely walled town in the west of Tuscany. I had forgotten just how pleasant Lucca is for a stroll - so compact, beautiful, full of things to see and virtually free of motorised vehicles within the walls.

 

Partial view of Lucca within the walls.

The main things to see in Lucca are described on the Lucca Tourist Information website. Here I want to describe some of the things that I personally enjoyed on this visit.

Map of Lucca

I arrived by train from Florence (1 hour 20 minutes) walked to the main entry portal of Lucca, Porta San Pietro, and followed my favorite route past Piazza Napoleone to Piazza San Michele to visit the church and admire there the very fine glazed, terracotta bas-relief by Luca della Robbia. 

The piazza was baking in the sun but luckily Lucca's streets are, for the most part, narrow and therefore shaded. Lucca is also noticeably well-endowed with excellent pasticcerie so that more than once I picked up a pastry to accompany very necessary cold drinks.

Pasticceria in Lucca

Lucca is also a remarkably good town for shopping, especially taking into account its small size. There are certain towns in Tuscany that attract wealthy visitors from nearby vacation areas and which therefore offer very high quality stock. Pietrasanta for example, attracts clientele from Forte dei Marmi and environs. Lucca is similar but, because of the large general tourist traffic, has in addition many moderately priced shops selling beautiful ladies' clothes, as well as a good number of leather goods and jewellery shops - the most famous of the latter is Gioielleria Carli, which has been owned by the same family since the 1600's. I found that Marchi, on via S. Lucia, had the best stock of "non-industrial" jewellery. Many of the others sell inexpensive "fashion jewellery". 

 

Gioielleria Carli, via S. Lucia, Lucca

In fact, the small size of Lucca, as for Pietrasanta, is a part of what makes the shopping good - there are a few streets packed with interesting stops all within an easy walk of one another. I leave aside the salumerie which, although attractive and full of good offerings, are not different from similar places scattered more diffusely in Florence and elsewhere. Via Fillungo is the main shopping street with many unique shops but also rather too many designer outlets selling the same old stuff. However, in the streets round about - via S. Lucia, for example - you will find many individually-owned clothes shops currently selling very nice linen outfits, among many other skirts, dresses and tops.

Next, time for lunch. Lucca is very well-provided with good quality restaurants. Prices are slightly higher than elsewhere in Tuscany but on the whole the quality of the dishes is very good. I went to my favorite - and the favorite of a great many others - Osteria Rosolo which is located in a small and quiet piazza, Corte Campana, off Via Pozzotorelli which exits the Piazza San Michele on its SW corner. As its name says, Osteria Rosolo is an osteria (a trattoria, a small eating house) and it offers more or less standard Tuscan fare (plus lamb chops). I come here for two reasons - the TASTE of the food is exceptional and the service is incredibly welcoming, informal and flexible. They have an indoor, air conditioned dining room but despite the general temperature, the tables outside were delightfully cool under the umbrellas. I was very hungry so I had linguine with vongole (both fresh and delicious) with a glass of local white wine. It was a trebbiano, a highly productive grape which usually yields a faîrly bland wine, but in this case it was excellent. Next, a fillet steak on toast with a sauce of mustard, cream and green pepper corns - fabulous, and cooked exactly to the degree I requested. With that I had a glass of cabernet sauvignon from Bolgheri - plus plenty of cold water. They willingly put my red wine in the fridge for a few minutes to cool it down a bit, an act of sacrilege forced upon me by the current heat wave.

Fillet of beef at Osteria Rosolo in Lucca

For the afternoon, I picked two sights quite unique to Lucca, the Palazzo Pfanner and the Botanical Gardens.

Palazzo Pfanner (also known as Palazzo Controni) was constructed in 1660 and is now the home of the Pfanner family. Felix Pfanner (1818-1892), a brewer from Hörbranz on the shores of Lake Constance, came to Lucca and founded a famous brewery. He eventually bought the Palazzo from the Controni family. Pietro Pfanner (1864-1935) was a surgeon, philanthropist and Mayor of Lucca from 1920-1922.

Palazzo Pfanner in Lucca

As my intelligent and discerning readers will recall, I am a garden nut, and you can safely believe me when I say that the small garden of Palazzo Pfanner is delightful, especially on a hot day. There I relaxed in the shade. The garden is surrounded by high shrubs and bamboo so that only the fine campanile of the Basilica di San Frediano is visible. In summer the big terracotta pots holding the lemon trees are dotted around - these are housed in the limonaia during the winter months. A short walk bordered by larger than life marble statues leads to a small pond with a simple fountain in the middle of it. The best view of this walk is from the splendid loggia of the palazzo. The apartments of the palazzo that are open to the public are of moderately interesting, and among other things display some of the surgical equipment of Pietro Pfanner. The main reason for ascending the grand staircase is the view it affords out over the garden.

My next and last visit for the day was to the Botanical Gardens in the SE corner of Lucca. They can be reached from Palazzo Pfanner via the Piazza del Amfiteatro (well worth a brief visit - some of the stonework of the Roman amphitheatre can be seen in the walls of the apartment buildings now delineating the outline of the amphitheatre) and the Torre Guinigi, the famous tower with the trees growing on top of it, and then following the Via del Fosso and its fast flowing canal.

The Botanical Gardens in Lucca - Sequoia sempervirens

For such a small town, Lucca has an excellent Botanical Garden, with specimens ranging from a giant sequoia to a good collection of insectivorous plants. They have a huge ginkgo tree, surely one of the first specimens planted in Europe. Ginkgo leaves were known from fossils dating as far back as the Permian period. The last surviving genus is native to China and was first described by Engelbert Kaempfer in 1690 based on a tree he saw in Japan. Specimens soon found there way into botanical gardens throughout the Western world. Not only the plants are interesting. While I was at the gardens, a beautiful hoopoe was busily digging up worms just a few meters away from me. I could spend hours in these gardens and will surely return to them.

I suppose being sensitised by an afternoon of plants, I couldn't help but be fascinated by the miles and miles of tree and shrub nurseries in the Arno flood plain visible from the train back to Florence. It reminded me yet again how horticulture dominates the rural economy of Tuscany.

More about Lucca: https://www.lucca.info/

Lucca on Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/lucca.tuscany.italy/

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Author: Anna Maria Baldini

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Open gardens day in Florence: Cortili e Giardini Aperti a Firenze

As my faithful readers will remember, I am an enthusiast for the formal gardens of Tuscany, especially those of the larger villas of Tuscany. I therefore always look forward to Open gardens day in Florence (Cortili e Giardini Aperti a Firenze) which in 2022, takes place on 22 May, when the private gardens of Florence are open to the public - see the list here. In 2018, I took the opportunity to visit some gardens in the Oltrarno which I either hadn't seen before at all or only a long time ago.

The one I want to describe in some detail is the Giardino San Francesco di Paola which extends upwards and away from the former home of Harry Brewster, "the last of the cosmopolites of Florence". Brewster, a descendent of William Brewster of the Mayflower, was also the grandson, on his mother's side, of the German sculptor Adolf von Hildebrandt, whose studio occupied part of the former Minimite convent of San Francesco di Paola. The convent is located at the foot of Bellosguardo, the beautiful hill that dominates the Oltrarno. It was an evocative experience for me to walk up Via Villani to the circular Piazza San Francesco di Paola. Although there are 19 C and modern buildings on two sides of the piazza, the old church and the wall and gate of the convent are still there, just as described by Brewster. The main structure was long ago divided up into apartments and, alas, the building is looking much the worse for wear. Indeed, so are some of the remaining Hildebrandt sculptures standing in the loggia at the back of the villa.

The loggia of the Villa of San Francesco di Paola - much in need of some restoration

However, the garden is beautifully kept up, as is the hay shed (fienile) which Brewster converted into a neat, strangely English-looking, cottage covered in roses and surrounded by a small lawn, where he himself lived in frugal simplicity writing his books. One continues up a series of irregular steps to Brewster's beloved belvedere from which there is a beautiful view of Florence, which because of its lower altitude, is almost more beautiful than the vista from the top of Bellosguardo.

View of Florence from the belvedere in the Giardino San Francesco di Paola

Next I walked to entrance of the Giardini Torrigiani not far from the Pitti palace. I have often passed the fine iron gates of these gardens - little did I know that there are 17 acres of gardens hidden behind the walls in the centre of the Oltrarno. In fact, the Torrigiani gardens are the largest private gardens within city limits in all Europe.

A view of a small part of the Torrigiani Gardens, In Florence

The Torrigiani gardens were originally planted by the founder of the Italian Botanical Society, the oldest such society, and the garden still has an uncommonly wide variety of trees, especially exotic species, in keeping with its 19 C “English Landscape” style. The gardens were designed at the height of the Romantic movement in the early 19 C, forming an idyllic oasis of green around the original 16 C villa. The garden hosts rare tree species, wide English-style lawns, herb and vegetables gardens, sculpted lions, a beautifully restored greenhouse and remains of the city walls built under Cosimo I in 1544. The layout of the garden is also profoundly symbolic and I strongly advise visiting it with a good Tuscan garden guide book in hand.

The astronomical tower in the Torrigiani gardens

Last but not least, I visited that exquisite jewel of a garden, the Giardino Corsi Annalena, nearby on via Romana. This garden is located on land formerly owned by the monastery of San Vincenzo which was founded in around 1441 by Countess Anna Elena (Annalena) Malatesta. During the long struggle for supremacy between Florence and Sienna, the area was dominated by the fortifications created by Cosimo I de’ Medici, including an underground passage that until this day connects the Boboli, Corsi and Torrigiani gardens. Following the destruction of the fortifications in 1571, the area was left abandoned for many years. In 1790, the Marquis Tommaso Corsi purchased the land, then known as the "Moors’ Garden", and the architect Giuseppe Manetti designed what can be considered the first English garden in Florence. It was completed during the years 1801 to 1810. If you have the chance to visit this beautiful garden, please don't miss it.

The Giardino Corsi Annalena in Florence

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Author: Anna Maria Baldini

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Anglo-American Florence since the mid 19th Century

Not everyone realises just how small Florence was in the mid-19th Century compared with today. The city walls were still intact. The latter weren't demolished until between 1865 and 1871 when Florence was provisional capital of Italy. I recently came across a provincial map dating from 1841. To the NE, Florence more or less ended just behind the railway station!

Florence in 1841

During the second half of the 19th century, a third of the population of Florence was made up of foreigners, the majority of them from England and America - the Anglo-American Florentines - along with numerous Germans, French and Russians. The English foreign colony between 1850 and 1930 included the poet Walter Savage Landor, Robert and Elizabeth Browning with their literary salon in Casa Guidi on Via Maggio, George Nassau, the third Earl Cowper, the countess of Orford, Lady Sybil Cutting (the mother of Iris Origo) at Villa Medici, Longworth Powers, Janet Ross, Norman Douglas, Vernon Lee, Bernard Berenson at Villa I Tatti and many, many others. The last direct connections to the last of the Anglo-American Florentines was probably Sir Harold Acton (1904 - 1994) whose father moved into Villa La Pietra in 1903, or perhaps Harry Brewster who passed away in 1999.

Aside from those who made Florence their home, there was a constant stream of illustrious visitors who came to stay for months at a time. In 1869, Henry James made his first visit to the city that became one of his favorites and one of the settings for his wonderful novel, The Portrait of a Lady.

Since that time, the city has spread out across the flood plain of the Arno, virtually swallowing up Prato and, no doubt soon, Pistoia to the NE, and with hardly a patch of green separating its outskirts from Signa and Lastra d Signa.

Florence in 2022

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Palazzo Chigi Zondadari in Sienna opens to the public

Everyone visiting the main piazza of Sienna, especially during the Palio, will have seen, although perhaps not particularly noticed, the Palazzo Chigi Zondadari which is located on the higher side of the Piazza del Campo and provides the perfect view of the Palio. However, very few know that the interior of this palazzo is spectacularly decorated and furnished.

From 8 May 2022, the Palazzo Chigi Zondadari in Sienna opens to the public on a permanent basis.

Palazzo Chigi Zondadari

The Palazzo was built for Cardinal Antonfelice Zondadari (1655 - 1737) and his brother Bonaventura (1652 - 1719), first Marquis Chigi Zondadari and founder of this aristocratic dynasty. The palazzo has been the Siennese residence of the family since 1724 and was the last palazzo to be constructed in the Piazza del Campo.

The Palazzo Chigi Zondadari is a typical baroque-neoclassical structure designed by Antonio Valeri (1648 - 1736), the last pupil of Gian Lorenzo Bernini, who was brought in from Rome to modernise and expand the pre-existing mediaeval buildings that were were purchased by the Chigi at end of the 17 C.

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Bust of Pope Alexander VII by Bernini

The palazzo is a linear structure, with five rows of windows, an internal courtyard and a splendid main staircase. The main floor is the most interesting. The halls and galleries have frescoed ceilings, house a collection works of art, archaeological finds, paintings and sculptures, among them a fine bust of Pope Alexander VII by Gian Lorenzo Bernini, and three rooms have their walls decorated in spectacular Venetian "corami" from the 1780s.

Salotto Rosso of the Palazzo Chigi Zondadari

Among the renowned artists who worked on the palace were Placido Costanzi, a pupil of Francesco Trevisani, one of the most important artists who was a followers of Carlo Maratta and of Benedetto Luti. Cardinal Antonfelice Zondadari entrusted the execution of some frescoes depecting episodes from the life of Pope Alexander VII and Cardinal Zondadari to Placido Costanzi. Another painter who worked on the noble floor was Marco Benefial, a pupil of the Carraccesco Bonaventura Lamberti. Francesco Nenci who completed the decoration of the rooms during the 19 C.

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Author: Anna Maria Baldini

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The Medicean Villa dell'Ambrogiana might become part of the "Uffizi Diffusi" project

A new and interesting possibility has arisen recently as part of the "Uffizi Diffusi" project in which works stored at the Uffizi Gallery in Florence will be displayed at other locations throughout the Province. The idea is to make more works of art easily accessible to the public as well as to enhance the touristic attractiveness of the new sites. The Villa Medicea dell'Ambrogiana, which is a splendid Renaissance villa located near Montelupo Fiorentino, might become a major location forming part of the project. Historically, the land and farm buildings, presumably including a villa, belonged to the Ambrogi family (hence the name) and were acquired by the Medici family prior to 1574. The latter built a huge hunting lodge on the site and this later became one of Cosimo III's favourite rural retreats. However, in the 19th Century, the Grand Duke Leopoldo II decided to transform the already crumbling villa into a remand home and then into a psychiatric prison, and this contributed substantially to its decline.

Villa Medicea dell'Ambrogiana

During November 2021, a government minister visited the villa and appeared to support the idea of central government funding to restore the Villa dell'Ambrogiana in order to house there paintings currently mostly in storage at the Uffizi, including some of those recently removed from the Vasari Corridor. The minister noted that "There are at least 100 works that today lie in the deposits and were historically here in the Medici villa dell'Ambrogiana, from the still lifes by Bindi, to the religious paintings by Cinqui that decorated that 'brother' of the Corridor Vasariano that we have right here at the Ambrogiana." There was even a suggestion that restoration could begin as early as 2022. The gardens are already in good condition and the building needs basically to be earthquake-proofed and given a coat of paint.

Montelupo Fiorentino is already well-know for the production and sale of Italian majolica, and is anyway well worth a visit for that reason.

More about Montelupo Fiorentino.

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Author: Anna Maria Baldini

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Getting married in Tuscany: great wedding venues in Tuscany

If you're planning on getting married in Tuscany, a wonderful wedding venue will be at or near the top of the list of "musts" to make the your wedding a super-special occasion. There's an enormous range of great wedding venues in Tuscany at your disposal so I want to mention some wedding locations of which I have personal experience.

Wedding dinner at Villa Felceto

For a do-it-yourself wedding in Tuscany, I can strongly recommend Villa Felceto, located on the Podere Felceto olive farm near Panzano in Chianti, halfway between Florence and Sienna. The villa, in ancient times a monastery, and the nearby dependencies provide accommodation for 20 people while the nearby agriturismi plus hotel and apartment accommodation in Panzano offer a good range of additional places to stay for your guests. The villa and its grounds provide beautiful settings for your wedding ceremony and wedding dinner. And very importantly, the owners, Roberto and Jussara, who speak excellent English, can and will provide lots of assistance with your arrangements, especially catering, so that you can organise everything without the assistance of a wedding planner.

More about Villa Felceto wedding venue in Tuscany.

Wedding feast at La Ghiandaia in Tuscany

Another great do-it-yourself wedding venue in Tuscany is Agriturismo La Ghiandaia which is located near the tiny village of Lucolena in central Chianti, 30 km from Florence. The agriturismo is an ideal location for a wedding of up to 30 - 35 guests all of whom will be able to stay on site. For your wedding buffet you can take advantage of the beautiful veranda with its panoramic view, ideal for dancing, or a splendid converted wine cellar for inside dining in case of rain.

Silvia, the gracious owner of La Ghiandaia, is ready and able to organise everything for your wedding. She is experienced in organising complete, customised weddings at her house, including accommodation, finding a church or town hall, reserving a suitable restaurant if required, organising the buffet and party at her house with musicians and waiters, flower decorations, rental vans and wedding car and in general everything that is necessary to make your wedding day happy and memorable for you and your wedding party.

Review on Trip Advisor: "A perfect Wedding" at La Ghiandaia in Tuscany.

More about La Ghiandaia wedding location in Tuscany.

Villa Vitigliano dining al fresco

Last but not least, the height of luxury and sophistication in Tuscany is to be found at Vitigliano , a recently restored rural "borgo" located between Panzano and Greve in Chianti, 45 minutes south of Florence. I have already praised this uniquely beautiful Tuscan boutique hotel, and I want to add that Vitigliano is surely the most luxurious wedding venue in all of Tuscany, with its own Turkish bath, whirlpool and professional kitchens. The Bridal Suite in the Tower offers an unforgettable ambiance for your wedding night, and the other luxury suites are ready for the bridal couple and their families. Accommodation for the wedding guests is readily available within a ten minute drive. Vitigliano has its own ancient chapel for a traditional wedding ceremony.

More about Vitigliano wedding venue.

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Author: Anna Maria Baldini

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Florentine villas and gardens: American and English expatriates in Tuscany

Villa Gamberaia , located i on the outskirts of Settignano above Florence was a favorite destination among the Florentine villas and gardens for American and English expatriates in Tuscany during the later 19th and early 20th centuries.

The parterre of Villa Gamberaia

Villa Gamberaia, celebrated for its unique gardens and splendid views over the city of Florence and the Arno Valley, has long inspired American and British landscape designers, from Charles Platt and Cecil Pinsent to Ellen Biddle Shipman. In the early 1900s, it was the favorite meeting place of Bernard and Mary Berenson, Janet Ross, Vernon Lee and Arthur Acton, who gathered for tea, dinners on the terrace and talks on art and literature with their hostess, the Romanian princess Jeanne Ghyka and her American companion, artist Florence Blood, two very talented women who created the magnificent parterre d’eau.

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Author: Anna Maria Baldini

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Villas of Florence and the 19th century photographer Longworth Powers

When I have a free hour or two - an increasingly rare event - I like to wander the byways of Florence in search of less known corners of beauty and history. Viale Poggio Imperiale, starting at Porta Romana and running uphill all the way to Arcetri is one productive hunting ground, lined as it is with beautiful villas, each with a story to tell. The avenue leads to the Medicean Villa del Poggio Imperiale which belonged to the Medici Grand Ducal family from 1565 until 1738, but which reached its architectural peak under the Habsburg Lorraines, the successors to the Ducal Medici as rulers of Florence and owners of the villa. It later became, and still is, an exclusive girls' boarding school, the Istituto Statale della Ss. Annunziata, but the magnificent imperial rooms are open to the public one day a week.

One of the imperial rooms of Villa Poggio Imperiale in Florence, Italy

A more modest but in some ways much more attractive villa on Poggio Imperiale belonged to Longworth Powers, a sculptor and photographer. Longworth was the son of Hiram Powers (1805 - 1873) who was an extremely successful American neoclassical sculptor, Swedenborgian and spiritualist, who moved to Florence in 1837 and settled on the Via Fornace, where he had access to good supplies of marble and to traditions of stone-cutting and bronze casting. He remained in Florence until his death, turning out marble busts and statues that were often reproduced in large numbers by his workmen and which sometimes fetched thousands of dollars. His studio was a fashionable stop on any American's grand tour. One of Longworth's brothers, Preston Powers, followed in his father's footsteps, first in America and then in Florence, but without success, and he died penniless in Florence in 1931.

The Longworth family in Florence - Hiram top centre.

Longworth Powers was eventually more successful than his brother Preston. He was the eldest son of Hiram and in his early life he struggled to establish a career, failing to persevere at any task for long, a fact that continually frustrated his successful father. Longworth enrolled at the United States Military Academy at West Point, where his family hoped that the education and discipline would would have beneficial effects, but he was "asked to leave" after only one semester. He then attended Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in upstate New York, but failed to stay long enough to earn a degree. His father thought Longworth might do better in Florence and so put him to work as bookkeeper in his studio while teaching him the basics of sculpture. Longworth created portrait busts and idealised pieces in a softer more romantic neoclassical style than his father, but his interest soon waned, and Hiram sent him back to America.

Flora (1880) is clearly indebted to Hiram Powers's allegorical busts but in a more romantic style

By 1860, Longworth was back in Florence and began working as a photographer. He was a great success, creating portraits of the prominent men and women in the city, as well as selling photographs of Florentine landmarks and works of art. He created a great many plaster busts of the famous and not so famous visitors and residents in Florence and bought himself a villino on Viale Poggio Imperiale, with an annex which he turned into a photographic studio.

The villa and studio of Longworth Powers on Viale Poggio Imperiale

The living room of the Powers villa in Florence - high Victorian!

Photographs and plaster busts by Longworth Powers still come up on the market. His photographic portfolio in preserved in the Gabinetto Vieusseux. Alas, a search of the Florence white pages suggests that the Powers family is extinct here.

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Author: Anna Maria Baldini

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