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An up-date on tradition! Jewellery made in Florence
[Jane Whittle]
They say that the best way to conquer a woman's heart is to surprise her with a piece of jewellery. A saying that is hard to follow when only a student! Even so, it is worth remembering that even the most indifferent and hard hearted are captured by a gift of this type and many sins are immediately forgiven!Florentine goldsmiths have a long tradition. The city was wealthy after making its fortune in banking and the cloth trade and the rich wanted to be sure of buying only the very best on the market.
Why else would the Grand Duke Ferdinand I, in 1593, have chosen them to occupy the tiny shops on the Ponte Vecchio with their characteristic rooms, held up by wooden trusses and props, jutting out over the river at the rear. Certainly it was because they best represented the city’s prosperity and the Ponte Vecchio was in those days a main street leading to the royal palace.
Ever since then the bridge has been a showplace for jewellery and precious objects, displayed, as in the past, in characteristic box windows projecting out over the pavement. Many of these old shops have been run by the same family for years and contain antiques or old equipment that date from centuries ago, in spite of the serious damage caused by the flood of 1966, when the Arno swept right through them. Since then they have been beautifully restored while their character and style has remained untouched.
Today the goldsmiths’ area stretches well past the Ponte Vecchio and sprawls into the main streets of the centre, from the nearby Via Por Santa Maria and Via Guicciardini to further afield in Via Tornabuoni and Via della Vigna Nuova. All of the shops (old & new) have something in common: fine quality, beautiful design and craftsmanship, in other words, the continuation of a tradition that has made Florence the envy of the world for centuries.
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