Isola Bella – or Ìsula Bedda, in the Sicilian language – is aptly named… The ‘Beautiful Island’ of Taormina isn’t the only place of this name in Italy. There is a perhaps more famous one on Lake Maggiore, but it is the only one in Sicily. It lies off the coast of Taormina and is […]
Sara Scarpa spends a weekend in Parma, a city famous the world over for its ham and cheese, but one that also has much more to offer visitors. We are all, of course, already very familiar with Parma: you must have had Parma ham, Parmesan cheese – and perhaps even a glass of the local Lambrusco before. These […]
Incase you can’t decide on your ideal Italian city to settle in – we have made a list of the top cities for you to make the choice a bit clearer. 1. Rome – population 2,850,000 Italy’s brash, loud, vibrant capital is a confident, thick-skinned place, secure in its achievements and completely unsurprised to receive […]
Max and Barbara Fenton from Nottinghamshire own a two-bed house on the edge of a small village in the hills of western Liguria. They spend a month there in summer, and make several one- or two-week visits throughout the rest of the year. What drew them to Italy, and to Liguria in particular? “We’re both […]
Italy has a bounty of jewel-like cities – small-sized, liveable and packed with beautiful buildings. They make excellent places to buy a home, offering easy holidaymaking and superb rental returns, says Fleur Kinson. As if it weren’t enough to have heart-meltingly lovely countryside, celestial mountains and a glorious coastline, Italy also manages to squeeze in […]
Marina Schultz divides her time between London and Rome, where she bought atwo-bedroom apartment in 2015. What drew her to the Eternal City, and what keeps her coming back? “I went to Rome on a business trip back in 2007”, Marina explains, “and was dazzled by the place – its energy, style, colour and history. […]
Molise is the youngest of Italy’s 20 regions, and perhaps its least-known. Decidedly mountainous in the west (and quite hilly in the east) it is perceived as being inaccessible – which makes it the perfect destination for the intrepid Heather Crombie. Situated between sea and mountains, half way between the centre and the south of Italy, […]
The room was found in 1975 by then museum director Paolo Dal Poggetto and colleagues while looking for a new way for tourists to exit, National Geographic reports After the initial discovery of the room, which was filled with coal, experts undertook the careful job of removing layers of plaster from the walls to reveal […]
He was one of the genius artists of the 1400s and a spectacular example of the Renaissance man. Andrea Mantegna (1436-1506) is one of the greats in art from the 1400s. Why? Because he was a true master of disegno, both in the literal translation of the word and in the deeper, more complex, definition […]
The Procession of the Mysteries tells the story of Easter through sculpture… La Processione dei Misteri is a Passion procession that has been held in Trapani, Sicily, every Good Friday since 1612, making it the oldest continual religious procession in Europe. It is, in effect, a 20-part story told through sculpture and depicting the events […]