Florence

Thanks to the diligent efforts of Italian Minister of Culture Dario Franceschini, the Mayor of Florence Dario Nardella, together with Eike Schmidt, director of the Uffizi Gallery, the famous “Path of the Princes,” Florence’s most exclusive passage, the Vasari Corridor, is finally reopened to the public. Commissioned by Cosimo de’ Medici in order to provide a safe route from the residence at Palazzo Pitti to the seat of government at Palazzo Vecchio, the secret passageway that crosses the river Arno on the Ponte Vecchio was realized by Cosimo’s court architect Giorgio Vasari in 1565. Brilliantly, instead of a dank, secretive tunnel, the Medici’s chose an elegant aerial passageway that literally elevated their status.