Boboli Gardens

No doubt one of the more beautiful and wonderful garden in Italy. The garden area is behind the main palace complex and stretches for maybe 2 miles in circular pathes. It has numerous statuary interspersed and a lot of pools, side gardens, and hidden walk paths. There is a Silver Museum, which holds a lot of silver pieces inside the palace that is in 25 rooms. There also is a Porcelain Museum showing many delicate pieces of eating wares, like plates, serving dishes, and many other valuable and beautiful items, some from Meissen, dating back to late 1700's. It is housed in a lovely building called Casino Caviliere, which was a haunt for wealth to wander and enjoy. It is form the 17th century. Cost to the gardens and both museums is Euro 8. The view form the top shows the hills surrounding the Florence city, a great view of the city, and Medici Palace crested on top of a hill. 

As soon as the Medici bought the Pitti Palace in 1550, work got under way to enlarge it; at the same time work also started on laying out the park behind the building, which was planned to occupy a scenographic setting on the slopes of the Boboli hill (covering 320.000 square metres) and also had access from the square. Its name probably came from the "Borgoli" or "Borgolini" family, who owned houses and land in this part of Oltrarno (literally "over the Arno"), close to the church of Santa Felicita. However the land and the farm that once stood on it belonged to the De' Rossi family when Luca di Bonaccorso Pitti bought it in 1418.
The Boboli Gardens were not to become famous until they became the property of the Medici family, who called in Niccolò Pericoli, known as Tribolo, to design them; this artist had already given ample proof of his talent with his designs for the gardens of the Medici Villas of Castello and Petraia. Tribolo created a masterpiece of "landscape architecture" in the Boboli Gardens between 1550 and 1558, the year of his death.

His design was used as a basis for all the royal gardens in Europe, including Versailles, while the park itself was immediately enriched with many Mannerist inventions by Buontalenti (like the Grotta Grande), fountains and statues by Ammannati, Giambologna and Tacca and eventually completed by Giulio and Alfonso Parigi (1631- 1656). The two architects, father and son, carried out the stone Amphitheatre, the unique setting for many celebrated theatrical performances, the cypress alley known as the "Viottolone" and the square and pool of Isolotto. The last additions, like the Coffeehouse (1774-76), the Lawn of the Columns (1776) and the Lemonary (1785), were installed by the Lorriane family who, in the 19th century, introduced several changes in various parts of the park, as decreed by the Romantic "English garden", then in vogue. Pietro Leopoldo decided to open the garden to the public in 1776.
The Giardino del Cavaliere, or Garden of the Knight, a solitary and private area in the grounds, can be found at the top of the hill, close to Fort Belvedere, with the small palace that today houses the Porcelain Museum.

When on vacation we try to find a spot in the city away from it all. Boboli Gardens provided that peace and quiet that we craved away from the crowds and the overpriced tourist shops. We paid 10 Euros each to enter the property and spent several hours walking around breathing the fresh air and taking in the view of Florence. If we would have thought ahead we would have brought a picnic lunch and spread out on the lawn. There are several statues and picture perfect areas throughout the gardens. We also went into the museum but weren't that impressed. We must have climbed 200 stairs and had limited access to the rooms. However, be warned, bring your own water as we couldn't find a water fountain anywhere. On a positive note, bathrooms are clean and free, located in the gardens and in the museum itself.