Escape to Italy

An irrefutably spectacular, life-affirming holiday

In November I escaped to Italy for a buoyant two week respite in which I was able to hit pause on work for almost the entirety of the trip. A truly novelty as I’m the captain, first mate, and crew of my self-employed business and the unintentional theme that dominated the year was drowning. I was mentally depleted and still in shock from the election results as I boarded a plane with an itinerary rich in palazzos and pasta. Venice, Florence, a weekend in Siena, five blissful days of rest at my friends’ villa in Lavagna. The goal was to indulge, to be overcome with beauty, flavor, and revelry. This is never a tall order in Italy — the country specializes in all of the above. What follows are vignettes from an irrefutably spectacular, life-affirming holiday.

Few things are stranger than arriving in Venice at night. The darkness out the windows on either side of the train. The flurry of the station. The quiet thrum of the vaporetto as it makes its way along the Grand Canal. Moored boats bob in the churned water, snug between wooden poles that mark their parking spots. It’s a crisp, cool night and everything’s darker than I remember. The city’s thoroughfare feels dramatically lit, as if it is a theatrical stage. Extravagant palazzos come into sight, one after the other, and I’m overwhelmed taking in the grandeur of the exteriors, only to then get glimpses of the ornately adorned interiors. Gilded ceilings, voluptuous chandeliers, lavish frescos. It’s dilapidated luxury at its finest.

The next morning, I’m inside the Gothic palazzo of Mariano Fortuny, agog. This is the definition of sumptuous. I want to examine every last detail, to try and imagine what on earth it was like to call this your home. A vast room unfolds, draped in endless spools of luxurious fabrics. An eclectic array of Fortuny’s singular fascinations populates the space: oil paintings, showstopper antiques, gleaming white marble busts, taxidermy animals, delicate Murano glass, vases filled with fluffy oversized pampas grass, piles of pillows, mannequins donning fur trimmed silk robes. Through a doorway, floor to ceiling frescoes depict a verdant garden resplendent with wild birds, monkeys, and allegorical figures. A library overflows with books, cloth bound volumes affixed with handwritten labels indicating contents of vases, costumes, armory — each with a tiny accompanying illustration rendered in ink. I am in awe.

One of my favorite details about the legacy he left behind is that he specified for his namesake museum to forgo the educational in favor of an emotional experience for the viewer. His vision was honored, in spades. Still, I learn these essential facts: after a childhood in Paris surrounded by artists, Fortuny moved to Venice in 1889, eventually moving into the grand palazzo that now serves as a museum to the legendary polymath. He followed inspiration wherever it led, making revolutionary strides in fashion and theatrical design while experimenting with photography and maintaining regular painting and drawing hobbies. He kept a wide circle of artistic friends, lived with beauty, and seemed to have just had a ball throughout his life. Naturally, I’m daydreaming about time traveling to a luxurious evening spent here, wearing an iconic silk Fortuny dress, and commenting that his latest rendering of his wife’s delicate neck is even more romantic than the last one.

Leaving Fortuny’s opulent abode, I wander the canals, stopping on every bridge to take in the homes with doors that open onto shimmering water. Each boat that passes is charming, each act of daily life carried out via watercraft is a thrill. I see crates of wine delivered directly from the canals. A gardener unloads six bags of soil, a spade, a shovel, a wheelbarrow. An entire classroom of children float by, en route somewhere. A narrow barge docks, heavy metal doors are opened, and a long arm grabs a trash bin, depositing the contents within the snug quarters. As I’m approaching the umpteenth bridge of the day, a siren wails and I’m tickled to witness an engine’s worth of firemen leave the station via fire boat. Turns out that witnessing the normalcy of an illustrious city’s infrastructure at work is just as mesmerizing as absorbing the grandeur of its exceedingly ornate palazzos.

I arrive in Florence in a haze, recovering from food poisoning contracted on my last day in Venice. Everything I thought I was going to eat here is thrown out the window, but what I am capable of are interludes of visual feasts.

I lean against the stone parapet of the Ponte Santa Trinita and gaze upon the Arno. The mid afternoon light is deliciously warm, even in November, as a series of rowers make their way under the Ponte Vecchio, inching closer to me with each stroke of their oars. Not once have I ever seen a boat on the Arno. It’s a river that has always felt peculiar in its lack of activity. I am stunned by the sight and think of Thomas Eakins’ paintings of rowers. I first learned about the series in a high school art class, being told that Eakins was such a master of his craft, you could tell the exact minute of the day depicted in those paintings. All these years later I don’t know if that’s actually true, but I’d like to believe it, to trust that someone was that astute in their observations.

Weak, but not entirely defeated, I spend the evening at Palazzo Strozzi as one of a handful of patrons taking in a Helen Frankenthaler exhibition. It may be the off season, but still, I’m glad that few people think soak-stained canvases at five on a Wednesday is the ideal way to spend their time in the birthplace of the Renaissance. I’m not exactly in the best shape for any kind of mingling, so I don headphones and press play on a jazz playlist.

An expansive canvas, twenty feet wide, kicks off the show — an amorphous cloud of cerulean blue dominates a field layered with lemon yellow, ochre, and lavender, with a punchy jolt of pink skimming the bottom edge. I’m in. I can barely pull myself away from this first piece and see the rest of the exhibition. Two small works on paper hang on the opposite wall and I’m bopping my head, not to the saxophone in my ears, but to Frankenthaler’s innate talent for creating ephemeral atmospheric delights, over and over again. No matter the scale of the work, an entire world exists within it. One you can get lost in, mesmerized by the exquisite expanse of washy but rich, layered pigment.

It’s bizarre to see some of these paintings in the flesh. Tutti-Frutti serves as the cover art for the NYRB edition of Renata Adler’s Speedboat, a book I toted around and reread several times throughout my 20s. The mere presence of it on my nightstand made me feel like I “got” 1970s New York. Years before, I had shrugged off Western Dream at the Met, thinking it too chaotic. Now I was entranced, getting swept up in the composition’s manic energy.

The majority of the exhibition is work I somehow never stumbled upon in countless library scrambles and internet dives. I’m grateful for the parade of surprises, for how often I find myself gasping upon each new discovery. I was prepared to be overcome viewing art made centuries ago whilst on this trip, but didn’t quite calculate how moving it would be to witness one of my longtime cherished champions of paint be honored in a colossal Italian palazzo.

Stuart and I are staying in the Onda contrada of Siena. Translating to the wave district, the internet tells us that the animal associated with this neighborhood is the dolphin. But the figurine rendered on flamboyant lamp posts and flags has scales, a whole series of fins, and smiling red lips showcasing pearly white teeth. Acquiescing to artistic interpretation, we swiftly become transfixed by the details of the contrada.

The city is divided into seventeen districts with long held loyalties all tied to the tradition of the Palio, a summer horse race in the grand piazza that dates back to 1482. That fact alone has our jaws on the floor. We take turns reading facts about how the horse races are conducted, the pageantry, who’s allowed to do what and when, the mental games involved. I scroll through an article explaining the heraldic and mythological origins of the various animals and symbols of the contrada. A porcupine, a caterpillar, an elephant with a tower on its back. There are alliances among certain contrada, and rivalries.

As we wander the winding arteries of the medieval city, we’re keenly aware of the clues that indicate exactly which contrada we’re in. Each one has a dedicated fountain, church, and museum, but there are personal effects scattered throughout the city, civic pride on display. We notice a small stained glass goose in the window of a home. There’s a lamppost with a prowling leopard meant to be a panther. We’re commenting on some particularly great light cascading down a building when we realize we’ve stumbled upon the porcupine fountain. Catching our breath after a steep climb we’re greeted by a shaded rhinoceros mounted on travertine.

We’re surprised to discover that one does in fact need dinner reservations in Siena, even in November, so both nights we end up dining at whatever restaurants will have us. One is helmed by an icon of Tuscany who found his way to the kitchen after failing as a jockey. The other establishment is decorated solely in Palio paraphernalia, eclectic vintage photos holding our attention. One image above our table is of a handsome jockey in a Renaissance costume with a full beard and billowing long hair that is reminiscent of Fabio. When the cashmere tracksuit wearing owner of the restaurant stops by to see how we’re enjoying our meal, we ask if he’s in any of the photos. He points to the Fabio one we’ve been ogling all night and tells us that’s him, many years ago. We swoon and settle in for his stories.

It’s only when we’re back in Florence, learning more details about the contrada from one of Stuart’s friends whose father is from Siena, that we discover the grinning big toothed dolphin won the most recent Palio. We’re ecstatic, marveling that our contrada are winners, as if two days of sleeping within its confines automatically initiates us into this deeply ingrained history.

Settled into our languorous life in Lavagna, late one morning Megan and I walk to Chiavari. Out the villa, through the garden we go, traipsing down streets resplendent in tromp l’œil candy colored buildings. “Look!” we keep saying as another painted wonder of artifice comes into view. We’ve snapped pictures a plenty, but we still cannot get over the building with a fake window revealing a musician playing the lute accompanied by a small, contemplative monkey.

We’re visiting Caterina and Segundo in a seaside resort town frequented by Italians in the summer, and as such, Megan and I are painfully obvious as the only Americans in sight. Regardless, we’ve been warmly welcomed by the townspeople and report back to our friends our new obsession with the local cheesemongers, and how I didn’t cause a riot when I selected two pears with my own hands instead of pointing to them at the fruit stand.

Top of the agenda for today is to enjoy cappuccinos and bomboloni. I had savored the famed bomboloni from Chiavari’s best pasticceria the previous October, during my first visit to Caterina and Segundo’s. It was my last day and Charlie insisted I couldn’t leave Lavagna without eating bomboloni. We had only known each other for a handful of days, and yet, she biked in the pouring rain to ensure I would delight in this delicacy of light lemon vanilla cream tucked into pillows of sugary dough.

I’m still struck by her generosity, that she had a clear enough read on me to understand how much I would relish such an indulgence. The memory is one of pure joy as we all sat around the kitchen table moaning over the pastries. They were almost capable of muffling the bad news that one of the olive grove terrace walls had collapsed in the onslaught of rain. Thirteen months later, the new wall is striking, hand built with top tier artistry, and Megan and I sit at a cafe table in an arcade eating bomboloni, repeatedly questioning how something so simple could possibly be this good.

On our last day, we stop at Antico Forno for focaccia en route to Barbieri for bomboloni, and then again on the way home. I can’t help but think that Charlie would be proud of this gluttonous decision. I have eaten focaccia every single day of my visit. In the garden, basking in the sun; walking the streets of Lavagna, hot and fresh from the oven; sitting on a boardwalk bench in Santa Margherita, fending off seagulls. This staple of Ligurian cuisine is the most incredible focaccia I’ve ever tasted and I can’t get enough of it. Waiting for these last oil soaked bites, the woman in front of me specifies exactly which parts of the steaming bread she wants. She gleefully repeats “Bellisima! Bellisima!” as her chosen pieces are being sliced. Treasures in hand, she turns and we make eye contact, each beaming with the recognition that we are both focaccia fiends.