Back in March this year I was lucky enough to stay at one of the Landmark Trust Properties in the Lake District called ‘Howthwaite’ which was absolutely wonderful ( you can read the blog post about it here ). So when we decided that we wanted to visit Tuscany this Summer and spend some of the days in Florence, we also decided to book Casa Gudi, the former home of Robert and Elizabeth Browning and one of the 6 Landmark Trust properties in Italy… and it was the most amazing apartment and sanctuary for the 3 days we were there.
I loved the sheer amount of space above our heads, the furnishings, the floors, the balcony the light and basically the whole atmosphere…
It sort of felt like we were looking after a special treasure for a few days and when we were out, I found knowing that we had Casa Guidi to go back to was so exciting; you step back in time and also completely out of the mad Florence tourist throng …
There are so many wonderful paintings around, and I was particularly fascinated by the one of the living room itself commissioned by Robert Browning after his wife Elizabeth had died as it was her work space, and it’s the picture which has been the image worked with to recreate the room… this was my favourite door in the whole place…it was like an entrance to backstage which leads to the bathroom and a room with bunk beds up a spiral staircase…a thoroughfare for those needing to keep out of sight!
It basically leads through this little lobby of the bathroom to a similar door in the bedroom…I absolutely loved the original tile and mosaic floors as well as the collection of rugs…I thought this Victorian print of ‘The Doctor’ in the kitchen completely summed up the age the two poets lived in… and the light felt like I’d stepped into an old painting…The balcony is also great and was apparently where their son had kept rabbits in the 1850’s… This is a painting of Elizabeth Browning’s siblings ( although if you watch Game of Thrones I think you could be excused for thinking they were related to Brianne of Tarth! )There’s an enormous door knob and beautiful entry buzzer before you even get inside, which just adds to the whole aesthetic experience, and I would really highly recommend a stay here if you want a particularly unique Florentine experience and it is literally just across the road from the Palazzo Pitti and beautiful Boboli Gardens.
