orvieto's.secret.underground

Years ago, our professor Carol had the chance to tour excavations of Rome and Etruscan layers under a Medieval church in Orvieto. The son of the then-archeologist has continued his father's work, and Carol arranged for us to meet him and explore this not-open-to-the-public site under San Andrea.
Right under San Andrea in the Piazza della Reppublica (a main square in Orvieto) sits the floor of an earlier Christian church, pulled back to reveal that it was built right over Etruscan ruins.


This was definitely a rare and a lucky opportunity to feel more connected to the history of 'our' city...

jurassic.fluorence

Best. Graffiti. Ever.

san.miniato

Every appreciator of Christian architecture who visits Florence NEEDS to visit San Miniato, which is in my opinion, Florence's overlooked gem.

A quick, inexpensive bus ride drops you off at the most fantastic overlook of Florence. A quick jaunt up a slight hill gets you to this unique church, who's complex floorplan sets it apart. A trio of half overlapping levels creates nooks and crannies of truly moving spiritual spaces, which allow you to hide from the rush of traveling and force you to sit, stop, and appreciate.

And once you step back out of the doors of this nearly hypnotizing church, you're greeted by this:

every.italian.adventure=excessive.stairs

It was time to redeem myself for St. Peters .

(See the entry "chickening out at St. Peters" for the full account of my cowardly descent down the 'up' stairs when climbing the Vatican's dome).

421 stairs.

Bring on the Duomo's campanile.

With views like this, on such a clear day, with no line (typically it's about 3-4 hours), we'll call this LUCKY BREAK #2.

laurentian.library

Our weekly Friday field trip was a sequel to our previous Florence adventure. We met Marco at the Uffizi Gallery for a on-site lecture about the evolution of Christian art from the Byzantine era to the Renaissance. I had decided to spend an extra night in Florence, so I had a list of sites to see. Adriana and I had similar itineraries, so we teamed up. Friday night was spent visiting the exterior sites of the city after checking into our lovely hostel. After three trips to Florence, I finally visited the Ponte Vecchio, when all the jewelry shops were closed. THIS is the way to experience this tourist-y site: no crowds, no pricey shopping, just the old style doors of the shops one after another. Such texture, such quiet--a chance to imagine the Ponte Vecchio in whatever time you want.

Florence was nearly silent on Friday night: a refreshing and intimate change from the tourist-packed June day I remember. Without the crowds, I got to visit my favorite spot in Florence: the always open loggia of the Uffizi Gallery.



We grabbed a fantastic dinner with a fun waiter who showered us with vino and treats, and called it a night: I had a lot on my to-do list for Saturday.

Despite the fact that the forecast called for the coldest day of the year, I woke up to a gorgeous, clear, sunny, and WARM day in Florence. This beautiful welcome to the day was definitely a sign of the fantastic day ahead.

We started our day off on a gamble. As students in architecture, we just HAD to take an attempt at seeing Michelangelo's revolutionary Renaissance steps at the Laurentian Library at San Lorenzo. These intimidating stairs are ONLY open to the public during special exhibits, which during the off season, were unlikely. Even if you hit it on a good day, the lines can be restrictively long.

LUCKY BREAK #1: We got San Lorenzo to find it was opening day of a Special Exhibit. And the stairs were open. And there were only 5 people in line ahead of us. And Saint Valentine's weekend apparently means most museums in Florence offer a buy one ticket, get one free deal. So without further ado, a rare treat of uncrowded, open Laurentian Library Stairs:





My inner interior architect was giddy. Thus 1,000,000 pictures were taken.



Imagine the wealth and power of a family--the Medici's--who can claim this as their private library:



The original labels of the library stacks/seats are still intact on most benches.



The ornate ceiling and floor speak the same architectural language: each square of the floor corresponds to a bay in the ceiling, decorated with the same characters and figures. Perfecto!

YUM!

Since food is so closely tied to the Italian culture, it would be ridiculous to miss the opportunity to learn how to make true Italian food. So KState arranged cooking classes for us with a well-respected chef. I joined the first half of the Orvieto group for class on Thursday:



Chef Lorenzo runs a fantastic restaurant in Orvieto called Zeppelin's, and for the second year in a row, he hosted classes for the KState Orvieto group. Lorenzo's restaurant has a secondary focus in teaching, as students of the Culinary Institutes of America often spend semesters with him learning the fine points of Italian cuisine.

The day started off at the market (well, first a detour to the oldest liquor and chocolate store in Orvieto, where we were treated to a few tastes before starting the day) where Lorenzo kept--quite literally--throwing food at us to try. Chef helped us learn which vendor specialized in what, how to buy the freshest produce, and how every market adventure needs to end with caffe and pastries. With ingredients in hand, we headed back to the restaurant.

As Zepellin students, we had to look the part--aprons for all! We broke into groups to specialize on a certain part of the meal--Adriana and I were in charged of making a metric ton of fresh pasta!



Others gathered around to start the wild boar stew, ragu sauce, potato flan, cake, fried artichokes, and breads.




The bread ladies had it down to an art.



After cooking for about 2 hours (and 'sampling' all the wine and champagne that Lorenzo magically kept showing up with), the 12 of us sat down for a great and giant lunch:


(My pasta!)

(wild boar stew=an Umbrian specialty!)

Stuffed from mass amounts of delicious food and wine, we were "forced" into doing a wine tasting--learning just how to swirl our glasses, examine legs, and of course, to vaguely look like we somewhat know what we're talking about.

"HOME" SWEET "HOME"

After Civita, it was back to the 'modernity' of Orvieto. Living on top of the hill means we've never really seen our town from afar, so we took several opportunities during our bus ride to stop and admire our Orvieto from afar.