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A taste for the macabre may be all you need to enjoy this place. A cast-iron stomach doesn’t hurt, either. Perhaps the most fascinating thing about this intense memento mori is its position, at the bottom of what was the most sophisticated of streets when la dolce vita was in full swing.

The highest of the original seven hills, the Quirinal was also the enclave of the ancient Sabines (see Rape of the Sabine Women) in Rome’s earliest days. Today, it is graced by 5.5-m (18-ft) Roman copies of 5th-century BC Greek originals of the Dioscuri and their prancing horses. The hill’s stark, imposing palace, Rome’s largest, was built in 1574 as a summer papal residence, to escape the endemic malaria around the Vatican. In 1870 it became the residence of the kings of Italy and, since 1947, Italy’s presidents have held official functions here.

This could be called the “piazza of the bees”, the Barberini family symbol (judiciously upgraded from horseflies when their fortunes improved). Both of the piazza’s fountains by Bernini have large, mutant-like versions of the busy insects carved onto them, to let everyone know who sponsored their creation. The central figure of a triton blowing his conch is one of Rome’s most appealing and memorable, made of travertine that takes on a warm honey colour. The other fountain is a simple scallop shell (see Palazzo Barberini).

Borromini’s masterpiece appears about as radically freeform as architecture could be in the 17th century. His response to this small space was to fill it with fluid undulations, which have complex geometrical relationships. Borromini succeeded in blurring the line between architecture and sculpture, resulting in a homogeneous interior topped by an oval dome.

In 1561 the pope commissioned Michelangelo to transform the central hall of Diocletian’s Baths, the frigidarium (cold plunge room), into a church. The result is this overwhelming space, which gives a clearer idea than anywhere else in Rome of how vast these public bathing palaces were. Even then, the finished church takes up only half of the original. Michelangelo had to raise the floor 2 m (6 ft) in order to use the ancient 15-m (50-ft) rose-red granite columns the way he wanted to.

This 17th-century Baroque extravaganza has perhaps Rome’s most ornate decor, most of it executed by Bernini and his students. The most indulgent corner is the Cornaro Chapel, to the left of the altar, home to Bernini’s shocking Ecstacy of St Teresa (see Bernini’s Ecstasy of St Teresa).

This may represent Bernini’s architectural peak, built between 1658 and 1670, the only construction over which he was able to exercise total artistic control. The wide, shallow space needed an oval plan, counterpoised in the concave curving entrance. The eye is masterfully drawn around the elliptical interior, where canonical elements are blended with sculptural decoration to produce an elegant harmony. For so small a church, the impact is surprisingly grand, made richer by the columns of red marble from Sicily.

This lazy curve of a street sports a number of belle époque grand hotels and canopied pavement cafés. It enjoyed its famous dolce vita (sweet life) heyday in the 1950-60s, when movie stars supped, sipped and simpered here for the paparazzi. Today, the allure is sadly limited for anybody other than tourists, but every visitor to Rome should come at least once to take a stroll here.