Every design for Firenze

Did you know that the Italian spoken across the country today grew out of the dialect of Florence? The city's writers, Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio and Machiavelli among them, gave it such prestige that it became the language of culture everywhere. Founded as a Roman garrison and named Florentia, the flourishing town, Florence later grew rich on trade and banking, was ruled by the Medici and, for a few years, served as capital of the Kingdom of Italy.

What makes it unlike anywhere else is how much of that history still stands in one compact centre, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the place many call the birthplace of the Renaissance. The Battistero di San Giovanni, the Campanile di Giotto, the Basilica di Santa Croce and the Loggia dei Lanzi sit within the same few streets, with the hills of Fiesole and Bellosguardo looking down on them.

Above it all rises the tower of Palazzo Vecchio, the outline every Florentine knows from childhood. Wear it and you carry the one shape that tells you, from any hill around the city, exactly where home is.