Markets of San Lorenzo and Sant`Ambrogio
San Lorenzo and
Sant`Ambrogio: two districts of
Florence with a wealth of traditions and works of art, immersed within an urban fabric where history and modernity live side by side.
San Lorenzo, the heart of
Florence best-known to tourists and visitors, grew up in the early Middle Ages around the church of the same name. During the Renaissance it became the centre and symbol of the power of the Medici, who enriched it with masterpieces such as
Palazzo Medici Riccardi a true prototype of the aristocratic Florentine mansion, the monumental complex of
San Lorenzo itself, renovated through intervention by Filippo Brunelleschi and later by Michelangelo, and the Chapel of the Princes, housing the sepulchres of the Grand-dukes of the Medici dynasty.
Nevertheless, despite its monumental vocation, the district of
San Lorenzo still offers to those who know how to look for them, precious secrets about real people and places, as well as masterpieces of outstanding beauty but less well-known, such as the Chiostro dello Scalzo with fine monochrome frescoes by Andrea del Sarto and the Last Supper magnificently frescoed by Andrea del Castagno in the Refectory of
Sant`Apollonia
Florence - Sant`Ambrogio Market
Slightly further from the centre, but no less lively,
Sant`Ambrogio is possibly the last surviving remnant of popular
Florence the
Florence described in the novels of Vasco Pratolini, which has not allowed itself to be crystallised within a oleographic image but is, ,as teeming with life and happenings as ever, the site of artistic and gastronomic experiments, a vital and multicultural quarter. Stretching out behind the Basilica di
Santa Croce studded with precious gems such as the Loggia del Pesce, the church of Santa Maria Maddalena de` Pazzi, the very ancient church dedicated to Sant`Ambrogio and the nineteenth-century Synagogue, as well as artistic masterpieces this quarter reveals to visitors innumerable little treasures of authenticity.
The districts of
San Lorenzo and Sant`Ambrogio, despite their differences in history and destiny, have one very significant element in common: they both boast historic food markets where visitors can lose themselves amidst the stalls and pillars, the flavours and the fragrances, discovering all the most authentic which the food and wine traditions of
Florence and its surroundings
have to offer.
