City pack · Florence, Italy
20 narrated stories about Florence — streets, landmarks and the people behind their names — about 64 minutes of listening. Play them here, or download the pack and listen offline on the plane, the train, the walk.
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Giardino Torrigiani, Florence, Italy · 3 min · page
The Giardino Torrigiani is the largest private garden within the historical walls of any European city. Spanning nearly seventeen acres in Florence’s Oltrarno district, it features a Romantic English-style landscape and a Neo-Gothic tower rising nearly forty meters high.
Via dei Serragli runs through the artisan Oltrarno · 3 min · page
Located in the Oltrarno, Via dei Serragli is home to traditional workshops where gilders and leather-workers still practice centuries-old crafts. These artisans' ancestors once dressed the Medici Grand Dukes and continue to shape the beauty of Florence through their handiwork today.
The Oltrarno was Florence's 'other side' of dyers · 3 min · page
The Basilica of Santo Spirito has a plain façade because the Augustinian friars ran out of money to complete Brunelleschi’s grand marble vision. Funds were instead used for the church's interior, hospitals, and feeding the poor.
Bianca Cappello e la casa graffita di via · 3 min · page
They died eleven hours apart in 1587 after falling ill following a dinner. While the official cause was malaria, 2006 forensic tests found arsenic in their remains, supporting rumors of poison, though some argue it was used as medicine.
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Le finestre di Hitler sul Corridoio Vasariano e · 3 min · page
The bridge was spared due to Hitler’s appreciation for the view from the Vasari Corridor windows, negotiations by German consul Gerhard Wolf, and the bravery of local resistance members.
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L'Importuno di Michelangelo · 3 min · page
Local legend says Michelangelo carved this profile, known as L'Importuno. One story claims he etched a talkative man's likeness behind his back out of boredom; another suggests it captures the final expression of a man being led to execution.
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The church of Ognissanti, Florence, Italy · 3 min · page
Sandro Botticelli is buried in the right transept of the Ognissanti church, marked by a simple marble circle. The church also features famous frescoes by Botticelli and Domenico Ghirlandaio, as well as a portrait of the young Amerigo Vespucci.
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The Bargello, Florence, Italy · 3 min · page
The Bargello was Florence's first seat of city government and later the headquarters of the Captain of Justice. It served as a feared prison and place of execution for centuries before becoming a museum housing masterpieces by Michelangelo and Donatello.
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La Torre della Pagliazza · 3 min · page
La Torre della Pagliazza is Florence's oldest standing structure, built by Byzantines in the 6th century over 2nd-century Roman thermal baths. In the Middle Ages, it served as a women's prison named for the straw mats used by inmates as beds.
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La finestra sempre aperta di Palazzo Budini Gattai · 3 min · page
A noblewoman spent her life at the window waiting for her husband to return from war. After she died, the palace reportedly shook when the shutters were closed, so they remain open today for her spirit to continue her vigil.
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Viale Giovan Battista Morgagni, Florence · 3 min · page
The street is named after Giovanni Battista Morgagni, the father of modern anatomical pathology. He linked symptoms to physical organ changes, and the boulevard serves as the entrance to the Careggi Hospital complex and the university's medical school.
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Via Luigi Alamanni, Florence · 3 min · page
The street is named after Luigi Alamanni, a Florentine poet and scholar born in 1495. After a failed 1522 conspiracy against the Medici family, he lived in exile in France, where he wrote the famous agricultural poem La Coltivazione.
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Il Porcellino, Florence, Italy · 3 min · page
According to legend, rubbing the boar's snout ensures you will return to Florence. If a coin placed in its mouth falls through the grate, your wish is granted and the money is donated to the city’s children’s hospital.
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Viale Alessandro Volta, Florence · 3 min · page
The street honors Alessandro Volta, the scientist who invented the first battery in 1800. Florence named it during a period of expansion to celebrate "Great Italians" because the city published his five-volume collection of scientific works in 1816.
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Via Reginaldo Giuliani, Florence · 4 min · page
Via Reginaldo Giuliani is named after a Dominican priest and military chaplain born in 1887. He died in 1936 during the Italian military campaign in Ethiopia while serving with the Blackshirts, becoming a symbol of the soldier-priest.
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Via Benedetto Marcello, Florence · 4 min · page
Benedetto Marcello was an eighteenth-century Venetian nobleman, magistrate, and composer. This street was named during a late nineteenth and early twentieth-century expansion to honor the "Great Italian Songbook," placing Marcello alongside other musical giants to celebrate Italian identity.
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Viale Francesco Redi, Florence · 3 min · page
Francesco Redi was a 17th-century physician to the Medici court, a celebrated poet, and a pioneering biologist. In 1668, he performed an experiment in Florence proving that life comes from life, disproving the theory of spontaneous generation.
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Via Taddeo Alderotti, Florence · 3 min · page
The street was named in 1920 after Taddeo Alderotti, a 13th-century Florentine doctor and professor. He helped transform medicine into an academic discipline and was mentioned by Dante Alighieri as a symbol of worldly ambition and success.
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Via Antonio Pacinotti, Florence · 3 min · page
Antonio Pacinotti was a physicist who invented the prototype for the modern dynamo and electric motor. Florence named this street after him to honor pioneers who helped power the nation into the modern age.
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Viale Francesco Petrarca, Florence · 3 min · page
The street is named after Francesco Petrarca, a poet, priest, and diplomat known as the father of Humanism. He is considered one of literature's Three Crowns and helped ignite the Renaissance by recovering lost ancient manuscripts from monastery libraries.
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