It was a hot Sunday in Florence...very hot... but high above in the hills of Fiesole a pleasant breeze blew and birds tweeted incredibly entrancing songs. I had decided to visit Fiesole on my next trip to Florence after having read "Loving Frank," the fictionalized story about Frank Lloyd Wright and his mistress, Mamah Borthwick Cheney. The descriptions of Fiesole and its appeal to Lloyd Wright and Cheney drew me there.
Some travel advisors say "skip it"...well perhaps if you only have a very short time in Florence. But for me, it would have been a mistake not to have seen this magnificent view and experienced for a few hours what attracted people like Lloyd Wright, Gertrude Stein, and other artistic people here. For afterall, you don't go to Fiesole for Fiesole, you go to see Florence spread before you in all its magnificance.
The tourbooks advise that one of the best places to enjoy the view from Fiesole is the small Parco della Rimembranza on Via di San Francesco, public gardens with benches, shady trees and a panoramic view. But I also wanted to visit the well-touted Villa San Michele situated on the site of a monastery founded in the early 15th century.
So we took a taxi from Florence and stopped by the Villa for lunch to sip cokes and nibble on lovely sandwiches on the terrace of one of the most beautiful hotels I have ever visited. The present building with its facade attributed to Michelangelo dates from 1600 when it was enlarged and renovated by Giovanni di Bartolommeo Davanzati. The property was owned by the Franciscan monks until 1818, when Napoleon dissolved monastic orders returning the Villa to secular use. One can imagine the monks walking the loggia of the then monastery and wandering through the now public rooms of the hotel. Inside the hotel, antique chairs, altars, stone walls, frescos and other religious artifacts all come together to create a sense of spiritual retreat somewhat at odds yet strangely compatible with the current purpose.
One of the public rooms that is used now as a lounge and informal dining space off the interior restaurant was the refectory of the old monastery. A magnificent fresco, completed in 1642, and later restored by Orient-Express Hotels, the current owner of the hotel, adorns the back wall in a three-part alcove. This is only one of the many interesting public spaces where you can sit quietly and read or write (as I noticed several hotel guests were doing.)
The guests rooms are either in the main building of the old monestary or in the new space blended into the setting in the garden area. There are also junior suites on the hillside between the garden and the pool and in the old Limonaia. The most coveted room I was told is the one situated in the former chapel with perhaps some of the most magnificent views.
I climbed up the hill near the small 17th century building to take some photos and get a glimpse of the view the hotel guest in the chapel might have. Ah I thought, some day I will stay here. From here I truly knew why Mamah Cheney and Frank Lloyd Wright loved Fiesole so much.
Some tweeps I followed for Florence:
www.twitter.com/toscanamia -- for Italian Cooking Lessons in Florence
www.twitter.com/tuscanyvillas -- for Information on Florence
www.twitter.com/aroadretraveled for Information on Florence
Another interesting blog article about Villa San Michelle.
