Palazzo Strozzi is one of the landmark achievements of Florentine Renaissance architecture, the perfect example of a noble town residence. It was the creation of Filippo Strozzi, a rich merchant from one of the wealthiest Florentine families who, by tradition, were hostile to the Medici family. Between the Via Strozzi, Piazza Strozzi and Via Tornabuoni, filling a space previously occupied by 15 different buildings, it is a massively imposing free-standing structure with majestic entrance doors of identical design on three sides. The first floor houses important modern art exhibitions every year.

With its facade of pink, white and green marble and its famous dome, which dominates the city skyline, the Duomo (cathedral) is Florence’s signature building. Originally designed by Arnolfo di Cambio at the end of the 13th century, the dome was the masterful creation of Renaissance architect Filippo Brunelleschi, while the facade dates from the late 19th century. Inside the Duomo there are frescoes and painted windows by some of the most famous Renaissance artists: Vasari, Zuccari, Donatello, Uccello and Ghiberti. To this day, the Duomo remains the tallest building in Florence.

The Uffizi Gallery is Florence’s most important art museum, housed in a palatial  Renaissance office building entered from Piazzale degli Uffizi. The Medici family’s magnificent art collection is divided by school and style in chronological order, from early medieval figurative art until the mid 18th century. Its best rooms are filled with Florentine Renaissance masterpieces (14th and 15th centuries), including the largest collection of works by Botticelli in existence. From the late 16th century onwards, the Uffizi collection overlaps with that displayed in the Palazzo Pitti’s Palatina Gallery, to which the building is linked by a corridor over the Arno. The Uffizi also contains the best classical sculptures in Florence.

The Accademia Gallery in Via Ricasoli owes its popularity to its collection of sculptures by Michelangelo, including the gigantic figure of David, a symbol of Florentine vigilance and martial courage.  When Grand Duke Pietro Leopoldo di Lorena founded the Academy of Fine Arts in 1784, uniting various institutes including the old Academy of Drawing, the Accademia Gallery was constructed to house the works that were owned by the art school. These also include the plaster figure of the Rape of the Sabines by Giambologna. The museum also has a fine collection of medieval and Renaissance paintings from monasteries suppressed in the late 18th century, a modern art section, and a collection of musical instruments.

Palazzo Pitti is in Oltrarno, near the Boboli Gardens. Several museums are housed in the palace’s sumptuous apartments, a superb example of the Baroque and Rococo styles. The most important of them is the Palatina Gallery’s collection of paintings, which includes masterpieces by Raphael, Andrea del Sarto, Rubens, Titian, Tintoretto, Bronzino and Caravaggio. The Modern Art Gallery contains works by Italian painters (mainly from Tuscany) from the 18th to the 20th centuries, while the Argenti Museum has a wonderful collection of jewellery and objets d’art made for or collected by the Medici family. There is also an Italian Fashion Museum, a Costume Gallery.

The Church of Orsanmichele was originally a loggia built for the corn market, and later turned into the Church of the Arts, the old Florentine guilds. On the site of the church, half way between the Duomo and the Palazzo Vecchio, there once  stood a convent with extensive orchards, where an old oratory was replaced in the 8th century by a small church dedicated to St. Michael Archangel and known as St  Michael in the Orchard (hence the name of “Orsanmichele”). The monument has been changed and added to several times over the centuries and owes its current appearance to a series of important restorations begun in the mid 19th century and completed only in 2006, when the Orsanmichele Museum opened.  On display in the halls on the first and second floors of the church are sculptures that have been removed from the external facades of the monument for safety reasons.

The Basilica of St. Maria Novella is one of the most important churches in Florence, and stands in the square of the same name. While St. Croce was and is an antique centre of the Franciscan culture and St. Spirito was the seat of the Augustinian order, St. Maria Novella was the landmark for the Florentines of another important mendicant order, the Dominican. The marble facade of St. Maria Novella is one of the most important works of Florentine Renaissance, a work of art of black and white marble inlays that was started in 1300 and completed in 1470 by Leon Battista Alberti. The Basilica contains a series of works by Giotto, Andrea Orcagna, Brunelleschi, Ghiberti, Benedetto da Maiano, Masaccio, Domenico Ghirlandaio and Filippino Lippi. Frescoes can be seen in the cloisters by Paolo Uccello and the Florentine School from the XIII to XV century.

The Ponte Vecchio is one of Florence’s most famous symbols. It crosses over the Arno River at the narrowest point, where a practical ford used to be. The first construction dates back to Roman times, and was damaged on several occasions when the river flooded. Along the bridge there are two rows of handicraft shops, originally occupied by the fishmongers, butchers and tanners and later handed over to the goldsmiths and jewellers in 1593 by Ferdinand I, who did not approve of such common trading and unpleasant smells beneath the windows of the Vasarian Corridor that linked Palazzo Vecchio with the Medici’s private home, Palazzo Pitti. The shops along the bridge overlook the central walk, and each one has a single window closed by heavy wood shutters, and they often have a back-shop which juts out over the river and stands on corbels (or projections). At the centre of the bridge the shops are broken up by two panoramic terraces, the one to the east is under the Vasarian Corridor, and the one to the west holds the monument of Benevento Cellini, the most famous Florentine goldsmith.