Quiet Luxury Beyond the Guidebooks
“Florence is not a city that asks to be consumed quickly. It asks to be noticed.”
There are cities that impress immediately: Paris dazzles in its femininity and prettiness, London can quickly overwhelm due to its sheer size, New York....well, NYC is a different topic these days alltogether. Not so much European culture, but North American survival fights.
Florence does something altogether different: It rewards patience – for the not-so-average-tourists who manage to plan a visit during the rare, gorgeous off-seasons. Those are harder to pinpoint lately, as the magnificent city seems to be constantly teeming with international hordes attempting to soak up an ounce of history and culture.
The first time I visited, I tried to be the cool tourist, the one who "knows better" but naturally, my mother and I still had to visit the Duomo, the Uffizi, Ponte Vecchio and Michelangelo’s David, dutifully ticking masterpieces off a mental list while attempting to absorb nearly five centuries of artistic achievement in little more than a weekend. How can you not when in the midst of an art historical Mecca?! It was Spring, not very far away from Easter, and my mother whisked my away for some quality mother-daughter time after I had spent the last four months holed up in my makeshift lab, cramming for my huge final gemological exam before graduating as a gemologist. Suffice it to say, it was a time for celebration, frivolity, joy and fun. Florence was the perfect city to indulge in any of the above. So much so, that I've spent a fair amount of time planning future visits - also because I've scaled every rooftop and building facade worth mentioning as Ezio Auditore da Firence. IYKYK.
During those fantasy plans, I stopped trying to “see Florence” altogether. Instead, I began paying attention to the details: The smell of beeswax lingering inside ancient churches, which there are plenty of - I should know, I only spent years studying them during my uni days.
The coolness of pietra serena beneath my fingertips, the quiet confidence of workshops that have been producing the same object, by hand, for generations, the perfume drifting from a tiny courtyard one almost walks straight past.
Perhaps that is why Florence has become one of my favourite cities in Europe: Not because it contains the greatest concentration of Renaissance masterpieces on earth — although it certainly does — but because it still feels like a city where craftsmanship remains a living language, which is also so very romantic in a fast fashion world.
As both an art historian and someone hopelessly obsessed with fragrance, I have come to realise that Florence appeals to me for precisely the same reason Silvanité exists in the first place.
It celebrates beautiful things made slowly, without letting itself be rushed or stressed, something the Italians do very well in general. It may not cause the most flourishing economy on the continent, but damn do they make delicious, beautiful things while managing to enjoy life. Something to look up to.
Florence: Where Luxury Meant Knowledge
One of the great misconceptions about Florence is that people come here for luxury shopping - if you want to go through the trouble of paying a ridiculously high VAT and then attempt to get a refund in Italy...be my guest.
Personally, I think they have the order backwards: Luxury shopping exists here because Florence invented an entirely different idea of luxury.
Long before global fashion houses, flagship boutiques and carefully orchestrated marketing campaigns, luxury in Florence meant something far more interesting, although the Ferragamo museum was an incredible thing to experience.
Concepts such as knowledge, technical mastery, patronage...Basically, the ability to transform raw materials into objects capable of surviving centuries.
Gold became jewellery,lLeather became books, stone became architecture, pigment became Botticelli, botanical gardens became perfume.
Perhaps this is why Florence never feels ostentatious in the way some luxury destinations do.
Its elegance feels earned, the very alchemical principle of transmutation permeates the air in every cobbled little side street.
If Zurich taught me that true luxury often hides behind understated façades, Florence taught me something even more valuable: genuine craftsmanship almost never announces itself: A Guide to Independent Luxury in Zurich.
Santa Maria Novella: The World’s Most Beautiful Apothecary
If there is one destination every fragrance lover should visit in Florence, it is undoubtedly Santa Maria Novella.
Calling it a perfume shop feels almost offensive, aside from the fact that this "secret spot" has been featured on TikTok travel guides for years now. Sort of defeats the purpose of calling it a secret, but it's an absolute must-visit either way, even if you do not plan on acquiring a fragrance.
The story begins in 1221, when Dominican friars established medicinal gardens beside the convent. Herbs were cultivated for healing, tinctures distilled for medicine and botanical knowledge patiently accumulated over centuries. Long before perfume became associated with fashion, it belonged to physicians, monks and apothecaries.
Walking through Santa Maria Novella today feels less like entering a boutique than stepping into an illuminated manuscript, which certainly adds to its appeal, if you ask me: Painted ceilings, dark walnut cabinets, ceramic pharmacy jars, handwritten labels and the faint scent of citrus, iris, lavender and polished wood.
One begins to understand that perfume was once considered something much closer to scholarship than commerce.
Its famous Acqua della Regina, created for Catherine de’ Medici before her marriage to the future King of France, is often credited with influencing the development of French court perfumery. Whether every detail of that story is perfectly accurate matters less than what it represents: Florence quietly exporting an entire philosophy of fragrance across Europe.
Perfume was never merely decoration, not in Florence and certainly not in the Officina. Instead, it was diplomacy, medicine, status, memory and my favourite - alchemy.
Aqua Flor: Florence’s Best-Kept Secret
If Santa Maria Novella represents Florence’s past, Aqua Flor embodies everything I admire about its present, despite it being tucked away in an old palazzo.
Hidden behind an almost anonymous entrance, the atelier possesses the sort of understated confidence that only true specialists seem able to cultivate.
Nothing feels rushed. Nothing feels performative, nor does the atelier seem to want to be found, unless it's by those who truly seek it - bit like the Room of Requirement from Harry Potter.
Instead, visitors are encouraged to explore patiently, allowing fragrances to unfold naturally rather than being hurried toward a purchase.
This philosophy resonates deeply with me.
Great fragrance cannot be understood in thirty seconds.
Neither can great cities.
One of Aqua Flor’s creations, Jalousie, became one of the very few perfumes I have ever emptied completely: Four Perfumes I Loved Enough To Finish.
Perhaps that says more than any numerical rating ever could. I may have gushed about Santa Maria Novella before, but Aqua Flor still remains not only the most visually stunning "perfume shop" I've visited, but I swear the air in there has a relaxing component in a way that I have not experienced elsewhere. The associates leave you alone, they understand that a fragrance must be discovered with patience and frequent sniffing, they are all well-educated in the house's story and seem more than happy to just chat about everything and anything...it's the sort of shop once dreams of when visiting a new place, one you can get lost in time and time again.
Florence Smells Different
One thing I wish more art historians discussed is smell.
We spend extraordinary amounts of time analysing colour, perspective, iconography and composition, however very little attention is paid to the sensory world these artworks originally inhabited.
Imagine Botticelli’s Florence: Churches filled with incense rather than climate control, libraries scented with leather, glue and old paper, studios smelling of linseed oil, egg tempera and freshly ground pigment, apothecaries filled with iris root, bergamot, rosemary and rose. The Renaissance was not odourless, iIt was profoundly aromatic - let's ignore the less savoury aspect of that presumably undeniable historical fact. The Renaissance was not exactly known for proper personal hygiene and advanced waste disposal systems....
Perhaps this explains why fragrance has always felt so closely related to art history in my own mind. What have they got in common? They both preserve memory, shape atmosphere and undeniably alter the way we experience space.
Gold, Leather & Beautiful Obsessions
Few cities celebrate craftsmanship quite like Florence, simply cross Ponte Vecchio and look beyond the crowds.
Behind those tiny shop windows remain generations of goldsmiths whose trade has survived remarkably unchanged.
As someone with a background in gemology, I can happily lose entire afternoons here. Not because I intend to buy anything, but simply because watching someone create beauty with extraordinary precision remains endlessly fascinating. The people watching is also phenomenal.
Nearby, another workshop deserves equal admiration.
The Scuola del Cuoio, Florence’s famous Leather School, continues teaching traditional leatherworking techniques inside the former monastery beside Basilica Santa Croce - another church very familiar to me after having studied it on PowerPoint slides for years. BTW, within the church's foundations lie entombed legends such as Galileo, Alighieri and Machiavelli. Talk about inspiring, hallowed halls...
Watching craftspeople cut, stitch and burnish leather by hand serves as a gentle reminder that genuine luxury rarely emerges from speed, but meticulous repetition without faltering patience or attention to detail, with experience, a certain willingness to spend an extra hour on something almost nobody else will notice.
That philosophy has influenced my own work at Silvanité more than I probably realise.
Benvenuto Cellini: Renaissance Rockstar
Standing proudly outside the Uffizi is one of my favourite Florentines.
Benvenuto Cellini: Goldsmith. Sculptor. Occasional criminal. Professional egotist. Undeniable Genius.
His autobiography remains one of the most entertaining books ever written by an artist, filled with duels, impossible commissions, imprisonment, miraculous escapes, absolute filth and scandal, and enough self-confidence to power a small country.
Most visitors admire his magnificent bronze Perseus in the Loggia dei Lanzi without realising that Cellini considered himself first and foremost a goldsmith.
Perhaps that explains why his sculpture possesses such astonishing precision and depth.
It was made by someone accustomed to thinking in millimetres.
Florence in Five Scents
If I had to describe Florence without photographs, I think I would do it through smell.
1) Fresh bergamot escaping an old apothecary.
2) Beeswax candles quietly burning beneath Renaissance frescoes.
3) Warm leather inside family workshops.
4) Dusty books resting beneath carved walnut shelves.
5) Espresso drifting through narrow streets just after sunrise.
Five very comforting, very specific notes that I love individually, as they make me recall very specific feelings and memories but imagine them all together! Perhaps something to keep in mind as I develop and grow Silvanité...the ideas keep on writing themselves.
What Florence Taught Me About Building Silvanité
People often ask where inspiration comes from.
The honest answer is that it rarely arrives all at once, but it decides when it graces you. In my experience, it often accumulates: One day you are trotting along on a trip and you stumble across a beautiful carved doorway, a wonky old pharmacy, you randomly yapped your way into an illuminating conversation with a perfumer...
Silvanité has never attempted to recreate an existing thing already or literally, although I do find myself very inspired and motivated to create an olfactory ode to Florence now.
Cities like Florence remind me why I started creating fragrances in the first place.
Not to imitate places, but to preserve feeling, to bottle atmosphere. And to create objects capable of transporting us somewhere else, if only for a moment.
Final Thoughts
Florence rewards exactly the sort of traveller I aspire to become.
The one who slows down. Who wanders into workshops rather than souvenir shops.
Who spends more time inside an old perfumery than a luxury boutique. Who notices the smell of stone after rain. Who understands that craftsmanship is not merely something we admire. It is something we inherit.
And perhaps that is why, no matter how many times I visit, Florence always feels less like somewhere I have already seen and more like somewhere quietly waiting to be rediscovered. Just don't order a cappuccino after 11 AM, your waiters will judge the living hell out of you and kindly let you know that you are an uncultured imbecile. And then still reluctantly serve you your dairy-infested monstrosity while muttering who-knows-what under their breaths. True story.
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