The dome in frame
The view photographers choose it for, over the dome itself.
Diego Delso — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Dllu — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Thermos — CC BY-SA 2.5 · Jebulon — CC0
Giotto's Campanile is the cathedral's freestanding bell tower: some eighty-five metres of coloured marble begun in 1334 to the design of the great painter Giotto — his era's supreme painter designing a building, and the result is a standing painting: pink, green and white banding and geometric inlay that make it the most beautiful tower in Italy. The climb is 414 steps with no lift, but generously designed: three intermediate terraces to rest and look out from, turning the ascent into a series of views rather than a dark shaft. And the summit grants what dome-climbers never get: Brunelleschi's dome itself, whole, in your picture, with Florence around it. Its original lower reliefs — the cycle of human arts and crafts — are in the Opera museum; the tower wears replicas.
The view photographers choose it for, over the dome itself.
A painter's design, not an architect's — Italy's most colourful tower.
Three panoramic pauses making the stairs part of the pleasure.
Piazza del Duomo, 50122 Florence
Opera del Duomo MuseumThe Opera museum is the Duomo's treasury: every masterpiece once on the cathedra1 minute walk4.5
Florence BaptisteryThe Baptistery is the square's oldest building and the one Florentines hold holi1 minute walk4.5
Florence Cathedral (Duomo)Santa Maria del Fiore — the Duomo — is Florence itself: a mountain of white, gre1 minute walk4.9
Dante's House MuseumDante Alighieri never spent a single night in this house. The stone building you3 minutes walk3.7
Palazzo Medici RiccardiThis is the first Medici palace — the house that invented the Florentine palazzo3 minutes walk4.6For the photo and flexibility: the tower — dome in frame, no slot binding you. For the singular experience: the dome — walking inside its body has no substitute. The fit do both a day apart; and the Brunelleschi pass covers the pair anyway.
414 steps — about twenty storeys — in fair-width passages with three genuine rests. Taken unhurried it costs no suffering, but it is not for bad knees or strained hearts.
The first hour beats the crowds; sunset gilds marble and dome — and the summit is fully meshed, so shooting is through grille at any hour.