Question of the week: as we prepare for break week travels, do you have a museum or gallery in Europe that you'd recommend? "Florence is wonderful, and its museums are wonderful: the Uffizi, the Academia, the Duomo. But if you're tired of standing in long lines, only to be herded past artistic masterpieces with no room or time to actually look at them, you may want to go a little bit off the beaten tourist track.
Try the Bardini Museum. It's small, so you can easily see everything that's there without getting 'art overload' and when we were there we felt like we were the only people who knew of its existence. Steffano Bardini, famous Florentine art dealer, left his personal collection and the pallazzo he kept it in to the city of Florence when he died in 1922. He requested that the collection remain discrete and that his arrangement be maintained. While this was ignored at the time, Florence has spent quite a lot of time and money putting it right. What you see now is what Bardini wanted.
His collection includes Medieval and Renaissance sculpture, a whole room of beautiful Madonna and Child paintings, and lots of arms and armour, as well as much more.
Did I mention that the Museum is situated in a student-dominated part of town? There are quite a lot of fun caffes and restaurants scattered nearby, so you can enjoy a coffee and a sit down after your art as well. What could be better?"
- Kris
* Photo by chelseagirl°, used under Creative Commons, with thanks.
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