Pentedattilo Calabria does not appear to have been built beside a mountain. It seems to have been caught in its grip. Above the old stone houses rise five enormous rocky peaks, separated like the fingers of a gigantic hand reaching…
Pizzomunno Vieste is one of those places where nature seems to have deliberately created a monument and then left human imagination to explain it. Rising from the pale sand at the southern edge of the town, the enormous white monolith…
Campomaggiore Vecchio is not simply another abandoned village in southern Italy. Its roofless houses, broken arches and empty windows are the remains of a remarkable social experiment: an attempt to create an orderly, productive and surprisingly modern community in the…
For one night every year, an illuminated tower almost thirty metres high appears to move through the medieval streets of Viterbo. It passes between ancient stone buildings, brushes visually against balconies crowded with spectators and advances above a hundred men…
In the green mountains of northern Tuscany, there is a medieval town where stone alleys, Renaissance palaces and panoramic terraces coexist with Scottish flags, bagpipe music and the unmistakable aroma of fish and chips. This is Barga Tuscany, a place…
High above Turin, where the city gives way to wooded hills and the horizon opens towards the Alps, the Basilica of Superga seems to belong simultaneously to the sky and to history. Its great dome rises more than six hundred…
In most Italian cities, Carnival means masks, confetti and elegant parades. At the Ivrea Carnival, the air fills with oranges. They fly across medieval squares, burst against wooden carts and cover the streets in a bright, fragrant carpet. At first…
At the far north-western edge of Sardinia, beyond the narrow peninsula of Stintino, there is an island where beauty and uneasiness have learned to live side by side. The sea surrounding it has the impossible colours normally associated with tropical…
In most towns, people look at a clock to discover the time. In Aiello del Friuli, they look at the walls. Across this quiet village in northeastern Italy, the façades of houses, courtyards, gardens and public buildings are decorated with…
In the historic heart of Naples, where narrow streets preserve centuries of voices, beliefs and contradictions, there is a place in which beauty and unease exist side by side. The Sansevero Chapel is famous throughout the world for the Veiled…