Florence, Italy

The Place Firenze

Price per night from$554.28

Price information

If you haven’t entered any dates, the rate shown is provided directly by the hotel and represents the cheapest double room (including tax) available in the next 60 days.

Prices have been converted from the hotel’s local currency (EUR510.00), via openexchangerates.org, using today’s exchange rate.

Style

Private perfection

Setting

Poised on a piazza

High, painted ceilings, panelled walls, a Louis XV fireplace and extremely well-edited modern pieces sit comfortably alongside every audiovisual requirement at The Place Firenze. While wanting to avoid any clichéd reference to EM Forster's tale of romance, it is virtually impossible, confronted with three floor-to-ceiling windows, opening onto a small balcony in front of the Basilica.

Smith Extra

Get this when you book through us:

A bottle of spumante, an apertivo each (for two people), and a surprise gift from the Place

Facilities

Photos The Place Firenze facilities

Need to know

Rooms

Twenty, including seven suites.

Check–Out

Noon, but may be flexible on request; earliest check-in, 4pm. With advance warning, the hotel can accommodate early arrivals (subject to availability).

Prices

Double rooms from £479.74 (€561), including tax at 10 per cent. Please note the hotel charges an additional local city tax of €8.00 per person per night on check-out.

More details

Rates include breakfast, welcome drinks and minibar soft drinks.

At the hotel

Library with books, roof terrace, free WiFi throughout. In rooms: flatscreen TV, on-demand movies, online newspaper access, minibar. In-room spa treatments can be arranged.

Our favourite rooms

Cosy and chic, and evocative of the refined style of the house, The Superior has high ceilings and a staircase up to the bathroom. The Duomo Rooftop Loft sits elegantly over two levels, with a 360-degree view and a romantic private balcony with a clear view of the Duomo – Florence's most-renowned landmark can be spied from the bath tub too. The Santa Maria Novella Master Room is spacious and beautifully dressed in cream and white; it has a canopied bed and overlooks the square.

Packing tips

A sketchbook, a sunhat, sensible-ish shoes.

Children

Cots for babies and extra beds for under-12s, both free, can be added to some rooms. With a day’s notice, nannies can be arranged to babysit for €40 an hour. The restaurant has a stash of highchairs and can tailor a menu to little Smith's tastes.

Best for

Juniors, tweens and teens.

Recommended rooms

The Panoramic Loft is perfect for families; set on two levels, there's a bathroom on each floor and the lower level has a large sofa bed for up to two kids. The Executive Suite is sizeable and spacious with a sofa bed in the separate living room.

Activities

The concierge can tailor tours to little ones or recommend plenty of activities suited to younger guests.

Meals

The chef can rustle up a bespoke menu for children using seasonal ingredients. 

Babysitting

With a day’s notice, nannies can be arranged to babysit.

Food and Drink

Photos The Place Firenze food and drink

Top Table

The sofa by the fireplace in the Bar is most romantic; but you simply have to hit the terrace in summer.

Dress Code

Fashionably relaxed.

Hotel restaurant

The Kitchen serves light lunches, afternoon tea and dinner, with a strongly seasonal menu of Tuscan specialities, and brunch on Sundays. Ingredients are plundered from the fertile surrounds, with olive oil and wines from San Gimignano, vegetables from a local organic farm, buffalo mozzarella from Campania and house-made breads. The room’s decor combines classic Fifties seduction with ironic 1970s references. Breakfast and aperitivo drinks and snacks are served in the dining room, and towards the back of the hotel is a cosy TV lounge with long white sofas, where guests can take light meals.

Hotel bar

The Bar, with its teak terrace opening onto the piazza, is a see-and-be-seen setting for an aperitivo, a glass of wine or a cappuccino. There’s an honesty bar for guests in the main lounge available until 11pm, with free home-made cakes, snacks and soft drinks, and a rooftop terrace open in summer. The Pink Room downstairs is a decidedly sexy club-like space for cocktails and conversation, and just beyond the Bar is a small bar with a row of tables where patrons can shelter if a chill kicks in.

Last orders

The Kitchen is open all day, from 11am up till 10.30pm.

Room service

Breakfast can be brought to you, and the Kitchen’s restaurant menu can be served in rooms until 11pm.

Location

Photos The Place Firenze location
Address
The Place Firenze
Piazza Santa Maria Novella, 7
Florence
50123
Italy

Planes

The nearest airport is Florence Airport, also known as Amerigo Vespucci or Peretola Airport, which is only 20 minutes’ drive from the hotel (take a taxi for around €20, or hop on the half-hourly bus from the airport to the centre of Florence). If you’re coming from the UK, however, you’ll have more choice of airlines if you fly to Pisa (Galileo Galilei) Airport, about an hour by road from The Place Firenze. There’s a direct train from the airport to Santa Maria Novella station in the heart of Florence, which is in easy walking distance of the hotel.

Trains

The Place Firenze is a leisurely few minutes’ walk from Santa Maria Novella train station, one of Italy’s railway hubs. You can zip to Rome and back in a day on a high-speed train, and it’s just as easy to get to other Italian cities (Naples, Pisa, Siena...) as well as further afield in Europe (Nice and Vienna, among others).

Automobiles

The hotel is located in Florence’s bustling pedestrian zone, so you won’t need a car to explore the local area. Instead, hail a taxi, or jump on one of the bright orange buses that service the city centre (buy your tickets in advance from the special vending machines or a tobacco shop). Driving through the restricted central zone (ZTL) can result in hefty fines. If booking a hire car, it's essential to send the vehicle details to the hotel (and give reception an estimated arrival time) so they can arrange a temporary permit for you. If you’re planning day trips into the Tuscan countryside, a car will be essential.

Worth getting out of bed for

The Place's concierge team has a host of excursions to offer, whether just a restaurant recommendation, a museum booking or a wine-tasting tour of the Chianti region. Cooking classes can be organised, in-room spa treatments ordered or hot-air balloon rides arranged…

Local restaurants

Cantina Barbagianni on Via Sant’Egidio is in an ancient cellar; it is ideal for dinner à deux, or a great-value two-course lunch. Formal and glamorous, Cibrèo on Via de’Macci is possibly the most famous trattoria in Italy. Thrice Michelin-starred jacket-and-tie joint Enoteca Pinchiorri on Via Ghibellina is set in a Renaissance palace, where Giorgio Pinchiorri himself helps you choose from his 150,000-bottle cellar. Olio & Convivium on Via Santo Spirito is a delicatessen and restaurant specialising in olive oils, native wines and local cheeses. Try your luck at ll Latini on Via Palchetti: the kitchen decides what you’ll be eating – you just name the colour of wine you prefer, and whether you want fish or meat. Cantinetta Antinori at Palazzo Antinori near Piazza Santa Trínita has a noble tradition (quite literally) of serving Tuscan dishes made with fresh produce from the Antinori estates. Near the Duomo on Via dell’Oche, Coquinarius is a charming, intimate place; its salads and pastas are popular with ladies who lunch.

Local cafés

Caffè Pitti becomes a restaurant at night, specialising in truffle dishes. The Roberto Cavalli-owned Giacosa, linked to his shop on Via della Spada, is a busy, fashiony place for breakfast, lunch, coffee and cocktails.

Local bars

Pop across the road for some of the finest cocktails in town in the Fusion Bar in the Gallery Hotel Art. In Piazza della Signoria, Rivoire serves superb hot chocolate, cocktails and aperitivi and is great spot for watching the world bustle by – with a magnificent view of Michelangelo’s domineering David.

Reviews

Photos The Place Firenze reviews
Stella McCartney

Anonymous review

By Stella McCartney, Fashion favourite

Unlike most people, I am usually filled with a sense of dread by the thought of a few days in Italy. Not because I have anything against its people or their magnificent country, but because in my profession a three-day trip to Italy usually equates to a huge amount of hard work in a less-than-glamorous factory on the outskirts of Milan. Touching down in Pisa with nothing more than a romantic weekend on the agenda is a delightful novelty.

It’s a warm and clear afternoon when my husband and I pull into Piazza Santa Maria Novella, one of Florence’s many beautiful and bustling squares. Situated close to the train terminus, it’s famed for its impressive Basilica and world-famous perfumery (a favourite place of mine, with ancient frescoes and implements, though it is the scents lingering in the air that make the strongest impression at Via della Spada). It’s also, we discover, the perfect Florentine bolthole. Tucked away on the corner of the piazza, between ordinary hotels and an Irish bar sits the Place Firenze. It is unassuming and discreet – only a modest plaque indicates we are in the right spot and not at a private home.

This 20-bedroom boutique hotel exudes style, privacy and sophistication; it’s a place where everything is whispered rather than shouted. On ringing the bell, we’re met within seconds by an immaculately turnedout member of staff who offers a welcome you would expect from a friend you haven’t seen for years. As the heavy doors close, screaming Vespas and constantly blaring car horns are locked out and a sense of calm descends. Surrounded by framed life drawings, sculptures, Fellini-esque images and books ranging from Helmut Newton to Umberto Eco, we are in no doubt that we’re in one of the world’s most beautiful and culturally stimulating cities.

The sense that you are staying not in a hotel but a private residence is most apparent at check-in, or rather lack of it. Our friends at the Place Firenze have done away with the conventional bowl-of-boiled-sweets-style reception desk and have plumped for a more personal approach. We’re handed our key in a small library, finished in dark wood, with mirrored doors that cleverly disguise the elevator. A refreshing glass of iced tea and a nibble on the torte of the day (served every afternoon in the courtyard), and we are shown to our room.

Having witnessed a very successful blend of modern and traditional downstairs, I’m glad to say our room doesn’t disappoint. High-painted ceilings, panelled walls, a Louis XV fireplace and extremely well-edited modern pieces sit comfortably alongside every audio-visual requirement. While not enormous, the room is sufficiently spacious to accommodate a large sofa, two winged chairs, a writing desk, side table and a super-comfy modern four-poster bed.

As someone who loves her fabric and is a sucker for detail, I couldn’t fail to be impressed by the perfectly pressed heavy damask curtains that are pleated into a fanshaped ‘puddle’ on the floor. While wanting to avoid any clichéd reference to EM Forster’s tale of romance, I’m finding it virtually impossible, confronted with three floor-to-ceiling windows, opening onto a small balcony in front of the Basilica. Our romantic weekend is afforded the full Merchant Ivory stage setting, and we have, without question, a room with a view.

Despite having polished off a generous piece of chocolate and Amaretto biscuit torte, my husband enquires about dinner. We feel in the mood to go rustico – or should I say, I am desperate for a real Italian pizza. L’Antica Porta is deemed by those in the know as the best place for it, so we take a cab off the tourist trail to an eatery full of locals. Having said ‘ciao’ to my health drive, so far, I suggest a romantic stroll back across the Ponte Vecchio to work off a few of the calories.

The following morning my Mr Smith heads downstairs to take breakfast in the covered courtyard. There is only one large table, encouraging guests to chat over coffee and the papers. (Though they can’t immediately oblige when The Times is requested, someone pops out to the local newsstand, quickly remedying the situation). I ask for some fresh fruit and a soya-based smoothie – a tall order in most hotels. But in true the Place style they duly deliver one banana smoothie with soya milk – big brownie points from this vegetarian.

Our Saturday lunch venue turns out to be another success. Cantinetta Antinori is owned by the famous family of Tuscan wine-producers of the same name and is only three minutes from the Place. In a relaxed, buzzy atmosphere we enjoy pasta with zucchini flowers in a light saffron sauce, which my husband deems one of the best he’s ever had – and he knows his pasta). This was accompanied by a robust red from the family vineyard, which goes down all too easily. We feel content in the resignation we have left ourselves with little option other than to return to Room One, take out a DVD from the library and spend the remaining part of the afternoon enjoying the company of our new-found friend: the four-poster.

All too quickly the morning of our departure comes around. We’re lying in our canopied crib, savouring the sun breaking through the curtains and the sound of the bells of Santa Maria Novella ringing out (the perfect backdrop to our final hours in Florence), when we realise we still have no idea who our host for the weekend has been. Having spent the last two days enjoying the Place’s hospitality, it seems strange, somehow, that we haven’t enquired. We eventually agree that it doesn’t matter; whoever he or she is, we feel like we’ve known them for years.

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Price per night from $554.28