Florence

Most people picture something like this view in their mind's eye when they think of Florence. In the PIPs I am providing a couple of alternative views, one showing tourists admiring the Old Bridge from the Lungarno and the other taken from the terrace of Hotel Lungarno, a perfect spot to view the bridge that is accessible to everyone. Above the three central arches of the bridge, note the windows corresponding to the Corridoio Vasariano, a private passage that in medieval times allowed the high class to cross the river unseen and undisturbed by the masses.

Detail of the side of Florence's Duomo on an overcast morning with almost no shadows. While the polychromous marble is beautiful in color too, the black and white seemed to work better with this abstract.

The clean up of the polychromous marble external decorations of Florence's Duomo has been taking years. In this shot, the restoration team had borrowed an industrial crane to work their painstaking magic on the corniche of intricate marble rosettes. A whale of a job!

600 years old this year but not really looking its age, the Dome of Florence's cathedral basks in the evening light as seen from one of the side streets that lead into the Duomo Square. Please see on black.

On an errand downtown I came across this procession of priests and acolytes filiing into the church of San Gaetano (one of only a few baroque churches in Florence) for a ceremony for the ordination of new priests, while a tourist, obviously delighted with her luck, was recording the moment (I am probably in her picture just like she's in mine ...) and the late morning sun cast long shadows of some of the boys in their ceremonial finery.

Another dated shot I took looking across the River Arno at the church of San Frediano, while a photographer and his daring subject ventured out on the Santa Rosa Milldam, probably going for a shot against the light of the westering sun.

Still working on my promise to post some shots of Florence. I took this photo as I was heading home across the new tram bridge downstream from the city. The blue hour was just beginning and painting both the sky and the river in blue/grey tones, in contrast with the warm colors of city lights.

On Florence's Lungarno, a rainbow (and a bird) ride before a summer storm coming downriver that has already engulfed Ponte Vecchio.

I promised I would post some pictures of Florence and I will start with this little known modern building that caused some controversy a few years ago when it was built.

A sleek Fiat 500 catches the reflections of Christmas decorations in the high-end shopping district in Via Tornabuoni.

The gingko trees at the Cascine Park have put on their splendid fall livery and provide a brightly coloured curtain when gazing across the Arno River at the houses on Lungarno del Pignone.

Swimming goldfish and floating leaves in a small fountain at San Salvi Park (the former insane asylum complex).

A sudden downpour caught me on the Lungarno as I rode my bike home. I remembered Palazzo Corsini has a wide covered entranceway and reached it just in time to avoid getting drenched. A work crew was putting up a glass covering over the Palazzo's courtyard and the rain distorted the translucency, blurring out the facade of the building.

Deprived of "fence hunting" for the time being due to the lockdown. So, here's an image from last summer. Entranceway of Palazzo Corsini on the homonymous Lungarno. I waited a while because I wanted to include a passerby in the shot and then, this young woman showed up and actually went in. I really liked how the stripes on her shopper criss-crossed the fence.

Morning comings and goings on the Santa Trinita Bridge, under the watchful eye of the statue representing Summer. The bridge, originally build from a design by Michelangelo, was bombed during WWII and painstakingly rebuilt afterwards. The four statues (representing the four seasons) were also fished out of the river and reinstated at the heads of the bridge. For years, Spring's head was believed lost but was eventually retrieved in 1961.

I really haven't the slightest idea why this area between the cathedral and the bell-tower would be fenced off. But it does show that fences, once you sharpen your eye for them, can truly be found just about everywhere! :)

On a hazy morning with still waters, this gentleman was enjoying playing with one of his dogs on the banks of the Arno River.