Ilze and I spent our last day in Florence walking back over the Ponte Vecchio.

We then made the rather tedious climb up through rather dull side streets to a car park called the Piazzale Michelangelo.

Why? You ask.

Because when you turn around there is this.

I have often pondered those words since I first heard them from Professors Mary Beard, Chair of Classics at Cambridge University. She was speaking of the rise of the Roman Empire from a not very spectacular fishing village half way up the Italian peninsular to become rulers of most of the known world.

But here in Florence 1600 years later, when you ask them, the answer is in five extraordinary names.

Leonardo. Galileo. Michelangelo. Brunelleschi and Cosmo Medici.

And they have left us this.

Brunelleschi gazes up at his creation.

It was even worth opening both eyes for.

We are off to Milan tomorrow so we thought we had better catch up on some of the fashions.

It seems next season is Pink

Pete

Who knows? But the world is a better place because….