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Fiesole was the hilltop town that Roman Fiorentina was built to compete with. The town has a Roman theatre, small museums of art and archaeology, cool summertime breezes and views across to Florence.

Arnolfo di Cambio’s asymmetrical masterpiece of Gothic civic architecture.

Alberti’s mathematically precise Renaissance façade contrasts with the textbook Italian Gothic interior.

Brunelleschi’s perfectly proportioned interior set the Renaissance standard.

Highly regarded estate in the Mazzei family since 1435, centred around a medieval village with a laid-back bar (in the osteria) for tippling. Recent vintages of the Chianti, Siepi and Brancaia have won the top Italian rankings.

Tiny resort favoured by jet-setters. The village is set back amid the pine forest, the beach lined with colourful little beach cabanas.

A devout Dominican friar, Beato (Italians honour him as beatified) Angelico’s origins as a manuscript illuminator informed his art. But his work is grounded in the Renaissance precepts of naturalism and perspective.

This version of the Annunciation was painted in 1442 by Fra Angelico for his own monastery. The sense of space is emphasized by showing the room behind the loggia, and the lush woods in the distance beyond.

Cosimo II protected the iconoclastic scientist from the Inquisition, bargaining his death sentence down to excommunication and house arrest.

Michelangelo’s proud David (1501–4) stands pensively at the end of a corridor lined by the artist’s Slaves . The plaster casts crowding one long room hint that this is still a fine arts academy (the statues’ black “pimples” are reference points to help students copy the works). (see Florence’s Accademia)