Lucca is renowned all over the world for its city walls, erected between 1504 and 1645. An important example of military architecture, the walls, which have never been used for defensive purposes, have been transformed into a charming promenade around the city.
Lucca is called the hundred-church town because of its numerous buildings of worship, the most important being the Cathedral of San Martino, the church of San Giovanni and Santa Reparata, San Michele in Foro and San Frediano.
Very famous is also Via Fillungo, with its Medieval buildings. The street leads to Piazza dell`Anfiteatro, which today is called Piazza del Mercato, where once stood the Roman amphitheatre.
The Torre Guinigi (Guinigi Tower), once the house of Paolo Guinigi, who governed Lucca from 1400 to 1430, and the Teatro del Giglio are worth a visit, too.

Pisa, one of the four ancient maritime republics, was once one of the most important Tuscan cities and a sworn enemy of Florence, Livorno and Lucca. Today, Pisa is one of the world`s most renowned and visited cities of art, thanks to the Leaning Tower, to the whole Piazza dei Miracoli - one of UNESCO`s World Heritage sites - and many other little jewels of Italian art, such as the churches of Santa Caterina, Santa Maria della Spina and San Paolo a Ripa d`Arno.
The Etruscan findings in Volterra and Pisa`s folkloric events, such the "Palio delle Repubbliche Marinare" (Regatta of the maritime republics) and the "Gioco del ponte" (Battle of the bridge), testify the city and province`s past.

Pistoia was once an important Lombard town and a lively and flourishing autonomous centre before definitively surrendering to Florence in 1530 (the year in which the town became part of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany). Although it is not a mass tourism destination, Pistoia is rich in interesting monuments, such as the Cathedral, the Baptistery, the Palazzo del Comune and the church of the Madonna dell`Umiltà.
Much more famous are the tourist centres scattered in the province: the Abetone ski resort, where Tuscan skiers spend their winter weekends, and the thermal resorts of Montecatini Terme and Monsummano Terme.

Prato was born in the 11th century from the union of the two villages of Borgo al Cornio and Castrum Prati. In the course of time, Prato was dominated by Pistoia and Florence, before being elevated to city status in 1653. Today, as in the past, Prato is an important industrial district in northern Tuscany, renowned all over the world thanks to its textile industry.
Although Prato cannot boast as rich an artistic heritage as neighbouring Florence, it nevertheless has interesting monuments, such as the Cathedral, the church of Santa Maria delle Carceri and the gothic church of San Domenico.
The Medicean villa in Poggio a Caiano is just a few kilometres away from Prato. The villa was one of the numerous residences the Medici family had in the countryside around Florence.


Villa Bellavista | In 1673, Francesco Feroni purchased a landholding from Grand Duke Cosimo III de’ Medici, situated on a hill that perhaps originated from the reclamation of a swamp area of Fucecchio, along with 45 farms in the Valdinievole. In the five years that followed, Feroni carried out a number of works, including the construction of a mill and a kiln. In 1696, Fabio Feroni, son of Francesco, started building the villa we still admire today, entrusting the project to Antonio Maria Ferri from Florence, the Grand Duke’s trusted architect and author of a Trattato di pratiche di prospettiva, fortificazioni e d'artiglieria [Treatise of Practises in Perspective, Fortifications and Artillery].
The grandiose building has four projecting corner towers and a facade in the Baroque style with a balcony that runs along the perimeter of the villa at the height of the piano nobile. Successively, a large clock was placed at the top of the facade. The entrance is formed by a portico with three arches. Inside, the rooms are distributed around an enormous main hall with frescoes, and disposed so as to create spectacular effects of perspective.
A majestic lane with a series of statues on either side and various ornamental vases traverses the garden, which was embellished by a large pool at the entrance. Water was brought to the villa by means of a plumbing system that drew it from the hill of Stignano. In 1699, Ferri designed an elegant and noble chapel in the garden.
Through the years, the villa witnessed a succession of moments of prosperity alternated with periods of decline, and in the 20th century, even of degradation. In 1938, it became property of the Ministry of the Interior which destined it to the Firemen’s National Assistance Society. It has been the headquarters of a solar therapy colony, and during World War II it was a hospital. An exhibition itinerary is presently being set up in several rooms in the Villa and will soon become the Firemen’s Regional Historical Museum.
Address: Buggiano, loc. Santa Maria, Via Livornese 28

Villa Puccini | Known with the name of villone, the villa was built for Tommaso Puccini in the first half of the 18th century with the earnings from his profession as physician, and was modified in the course of time until it assumed its present neoclassical look.
In the 19th century, Niccolò Puccini, a promoter of the Parentalia Society to Great Italians, placed at the disposal of Filippo Pacini a microscope that the Pistoian scientist used in the villa to conduct his first anatomical and histological studies.
The spacious garden, realised between 1821 and 1844 by order of Niccolò Puccini, was furnished with various buildings, several of which were dedicated to science: a Pantheon to illustrious men, a Temple of Pythagoras, a monument to science, one to industry, a hemicycle dedicated to Galileo Galilei and a column surmounted by a statue of Carl Linnaeus, to whose memory the park was dedicated. The disposition of the hydraulic structure of the two lakes and of the brooks was entrusted to Pistoian architect Giovanni Gambini who, in that period, was also working on Villa Celle.
Emanuele Repetti defined the garden as a place «enchanted that would be difficult to describe as it deserves». Today, it no longer presents its original aspect, and several of its monuments have disappeared. Substantially unchanged, however, is the Gothic Castle (or Fortress), one of the monumental buildings that enriched the garden and that in 1836 became the habitual residence of Niccolò Puccini. Precise nineteenth-century descriptions, drafted on the occasion of the sale by auction of the property, testify that the middle tower had a lighting conductor on top of the roof, and curious contraptions which, according to a widespread anecdote, permitted Niccolò Puccini not to abandon his bedroom to receive guests: «the inner wall of this bedroom houses various brass handles that, by means of a proper mechanism, serve to open and close the window, open and close the entry gate and other uses, today out of order».
The property was divided first due to the construction of the road for Porretta, the new Via Leopolda (1847), and then by the construction of the Porrettana Railway (1864). The area that embraces the Fortress, the Gothic temple, the pantheon and several monuments, including the one to Galileo, were purchased in 1867 by Florentine attorney Oreste Ciampi. The remaining part of the complex is today a public park.
Address: Pistoia, Via Dalmazia 356

Villa Celle | Villa Celle began to take on its present appearance as of the second half of the 17th century, when the Fabroni family began to modernise it. Cardinal Carlo Agostino Fabroni, in particular, organised the orchard plantations, the farms, and reordered the waterworks, building pools, nymphaeums and fountains. The facade is characterised by its large Baroque pediment and clock, which recalls the analogous solution of the Villa di Bellavista. In the second half of the 18th century, work began on the villa’s new service road, which tradition claims was done on a project by Leonardo Ximenes. The gardens and woods were laid out on typically Baroque geometric schemes. A "Chinese" aviary of brick and iron was built in 1812. Between 1841 and 1842, a rectangular waterbody was excavated on the northern edge of the woods to produce the ice for the icehouse, which was formed by a well having the shape of a truncated cone, made of dry-walled stone blocks, and equipped with a drainage canal and a catch basin for the infiltration waters. The icehouse water was also utilised in the dairy, a small building that recalls the icehouses of the Pistoian mountain.
The transformation into a romantic park was carried out in the mid 19th century under the direction of Pistoian architect Giovanni Gambini. The little "Chinese" lake with natural forms was inaugurated in 1845. Its little island resting on grottoes had a berth for small boats and a little neoclassical temple. A small bridge that passed over a rocky ravine with a waterfall led to the lake. The year 1848 marked the onset of work on an amphitheatre with natural forms, crowned by the neo-gothic "Temple of the Fountain-head" (today the "Tea House"). The results that Gambini achieved were so remarkable that Niccolò Puccini summoned him for the lake of his own villa at Scornio.
In the late 19th century, the lemon-house was renovated to its present form, and the Michelucci Foundry was commissioned with manufacturing the gates for the villa and farm. During World War II, the villa was occupied by a German military command post and transformed into a hospital, while a bunker was excavated in the park. In 1969, the Celle property was purchased by entrepreneur Giuliano Gori who collected contemporary art, and here formed the first collection of environmental art.
Address: Pistoia, Santomato, Via Montalese 7/A

Garden of the Villa Reale di Marlia | The Villa Marlia is an Italian Renaissance residence in the province of Lucca. It is famous for its water garden, especially the water theatre.
The earliest records of Villa Reale di Marlia date back to 1517, when the Buonvisi family purchased the property from the Avvocati family. In 1651 it passed into the hands of Oliviero and Lelio Orsetti, and it was these new owners who, as a late 18th century print demonstrates, redesigned the garden and built the so-called Palazzina dell'Orologio, or "clockhouse". This building has a loggia over the doorway, with a raised section above containing the clock that gives the building its name. The building was called "'Marly", in memory of a villa of the same name that existed near Paris at the time of Louis XIV.
Gardens in Tuscany | Villa Reale di Marlia and other gardens around Lucca