Paula's Tour Talk

Great Buys in Florence

I just received an email from one of the women who traveled with us on last fall's  Artful Tour of Florence & Venice. Christy, who's now a friend, sent me a link to an article from Budget Traveler titled What $100 Buys in Florence. "We went to a lot of these shops, didn't we?" she asked.

Yes, we did. And the lovely shops where you can find leather gloves for under $25, hand-made soaps for $15, marbleized paper notebooks for about $30 listed in the article are only a beginning.

As owners of Time of Your Life Tours, Teresa and I are always on the look-out for unique shops and great buys in Italy, and Florence is one of our favorite cities for shopping. There are a lot of treasures you can find for well under $100.

We know where artists sell beautiful small paintings for tiny prices, a shop that specializes in olive oil and olive oil products (I especially love the lip balm), kitchen stores for gadgets, pottery stores for gorgeous Italian dishes, markets for specialty pastas and vinegars, and much more.

Perhaps you'd love to bring all your friends silk and cashmere shawls. We know where you can get a great deal on a fantastic selection of colors. We know tiny jewelry stores where everything is made on the premises (and only 1 or 2 customers can squeeze in at a time), where you can find stunning earrings and other pieces for about $40.

And that's just the beginning. As Christy knows, we can help our clients find whatever they are looking for whether it's lingerie, Italian art supplies, gifts for children and babies, or a butter soft leather bag for themselves.

Our tours specialize in art, but we love to shop too! Italy is a great place for beautiful handmade goods of many kinds, where attention to detail is an art. I can't wait to get back to Florence in October....I am already working on my list of Christmas gifts. Oh, and I want to remember to pick out my Christmas cards there, too...

Thanks for the link, Christy!

Exclusive Shopping

My client and I are having a great time. After relaxing in Lake's Como's most charming town of Varenna (pictured at left), we've been visiting the art treasures of Florence. We had a wonderful afternoon yesterday in the Uffizi.

Tomorrow we are going out to the famous designer mall (simply called The Mall) about 30 miles outside Florence. My budget doesn't include designer clothes, but I am looking forward to taking a look. Virtually every Italian designer has a store out there ( with prices reduced up to 70% for last season's looks), including Dolce and Gabana, Fendi, Armani, Tod's, Ferragamo, and Gucci.

I've heard mixed reviews of the shopping experience and am anxious to check it out for myself. If it's really fabulous, we'll offer a visit as part of Time of Your Life Tours' trips to Florence.

Civilized Shopping in Florence

As soon as I heard about it, I pre-ordered the fantastic Civilized Shopper's Guide to Florence. Happily it arrived just in time to toss in my bag for Time of Your Life Tours' October trip. I think it's the best I've ever seen.

It's tiny enough to fit in your purse and jam-packed with great information. The guide is divided into Walks in all the major neighborhoods in Florence on both sides of the Arno, including Santa Maria Novella, Santo Spirito, San Marco, and of course, the Historic Center.

Each section begins with a very clear map with all the shops marked. Also included are nice amenities like a size chart showing both Italian and US sizes, restaurant and cafe suggestions for the weary, and a gorgeous full color photo of every store.

In each area, you'll find a selection of the very best and most unusual shops in a range of prices. You'll find shops selling buttons, chocolates, powdered pigments for artists, herbal remedies and cosmetics, kitchen ware, sealing wax, gilded picture frames, and tassels to name a few of the more exotic. You'll find shops for leather handbags, belts, shoes, and gloves, and for fancy lingerie, adorable baby clothes and toys, hats, jewelry of all kinds, silks, gorgeous handmade paper, and much, much more.

This is the kind of shopping you hope for when you travel--the marvelous, unique, often handmade treasures, perfect for gifts or to indulge yourself--in a range of prices.

I was delighted to find that I knew over half of these places already, and thrilled to discover some new ones to browse and explore. An Artful Tour of Forence and Venice  leaves next week, and I can't wait to check them out with the women on the tour.

I will try and post when I can from Italy and will have lots to share when we return.

Potions, Lotions, and Perfumes

It must be time for me to go to Italy---I just eked out the very last bit of the precious almond hand cream that I buy from the lovely Officina Profumo Farmaceutica di Santa Maria Novella. Near the imposing church (and train station) of the same name in Florence, hidden among non-descript buildings in an out-of-the-way street, stands one of Europe's oldest pharmacies.

This is not your neighborhood Walgreen's. The entry and various sales rooms are so gorgeous that they would be worth a visit, even if nothing were sold here. There are colorful frescoes---my favorite was created in 1848 for the main sales room. It depicts the four corners of the world where the fame of the pharmacy's aromatic and efficacious products had spread. There are magnificent chandeliers, marble floors, elegant display cases, and most of all the heavenly scents of rare perfumes.

The origins of the pharmacy go back to 1221 when a group of Dominican friars came to Florence, built their convent, and planted a large herb garden. The friars dispensed tinctures and ointments to the poor and soon started making the scented potions favored by the wealthy. Their products became highly sought after, and the most popular was a concentrated rose water which they touted as protecting its users from the plague.

In 1612, when the Grand Duke of Tuscany officially granted the Dominican friars of Santa Maria Novella the right to sell their herbal products, the Officina Profumo opened its doors and has prepared and sold remedies and luxuries ever since. The pharmacy still sells such venerable products as "Skin Whitening Powder" and Aceto dei Sette Ladri ("Vinegar of the Seven Thieves"), prescribed for hundreds of years for fainting spells.

One especially famous product is the perfume once known as Eau de la Reine ("Water of the Queen"). Originally created for Catherine de' Medici before she left Florence for Paris where she married Henri II and became Queen of France, the Renaissance formula was re-created in the early 16th century by one Giovanni Paolo Feminis. He later moved to Cologne, Germany and re-named his popular scent eau de cologne.

Today the pharmacy is no longer run by friars, but it privately owned. However, you can still find all kinds of deliciously scented products made with natural ingredients and ancient formulas: perfumes and colognes, potpourris and incense, candles, sachets and more. You can also buy rich face, hand and body creams, luxurious scented lotions, and hard-milled soaps, handmade and carefully wrapped and aged for six months. Of course, you can find my own personal favorite almond hand cream. Just opening the jar always carries me back to Florence, if only for an instant.

This is a wonderful place to shop for delightful and easy-to-transport gifts, and Teresa and I consider it a must-see. Time of Your Life Tour's An Artful Tour of Florence & Venice and Tastes of Tuscany both include a visit to this amazing emporium.

Fun in the Florentine Markets

Florence is famous for leather purses, shoes and jackets, for gorgeous marbleized paper goods, for charming  pottery and ceramics (from the nearby hill towns) , and in the sparkling shops that line the Ponte Vecchio you'll find gold jewelry in antique and modern designs. Teresa and I worked hard to find the best shops and fairest prices on these items (and, just so you know, we NEVER take commissions or kick-backs of any kind) and can help you shop for all kinds of high quality Italian products. However, Florence is also a treasure trove of small items that make perfect gifts and souvenirs. The best, and certainly the most lively and fun, places to shop for these are the two outdoor markets, the Mercato Nuovo  and Mercato di San Lorenzo.

The Mercato Nuovo, the "new market," until fairly recently also called the Straw Market, is a colorful, bustling array of small vendor stands beneath a beautiful loggia built by Grand Duke Cosimo Medici in the 1500's. Locals often call it the "Porcellino" after the large bronze boar erected in 1612. (Legend says that if you rub the beast's snout, you are destined to return to Florence someday--it's always worked for me). Here you will find a myriad of inexpensive leather bags and belts, scarves, silk (or at least, silken) ties, toys, t-shirts, knick-knacks, and souvenirs of every kind. Teresa found a lovely woolen shawl for her mother, some small painted religious icons for her sister-in-law, a bunch of darling wooden Pinocchio-head wine stoppers, and more here. This lively market is not far from the Duomo and is open during lunchtime. It's a fun place to browse and pick up gifts to bring home.

The Mercato di San Lorenzo is even larger and busier than the Mercato Nuovo. It's an open air market that snakes through several streets with a lot of the same sorts of goods you'd find at the Nuovo, but in greater numbers and perhaps more variety. There is vendor after vendor in canvas-covered stalls (called bancarelle); they all speak English, most accept credit cards (bartering is pretty much a thing of the past despite what some guidebooks advise), and all are trying hard to make a sale. It's a great place to shop and browse and very near the Florence's famous food market, the Mercato Centrale, where you'll find mouth-watering displays of cured and fresh meats, colorful fruits and vegetables, fish, cheeses, breads and more. You can pick up a sandwich to take outside and eat (it's usually too chilly for me to be happy eating inside). You can also find small bottles of olive oils and flavored vinegars, packaged pastas, and other small items to bring home.

No trip to Florence would be complete without a visit to these lively markets. (Yes, of course, Teresa and I will take you there).