People often ask if I came to Florence to write the book. It was really more a case that I wrote the book so I would have a good excuse to continue visiting Florence. That, and the fact that I simply love this city. I had fallen in love with Florence long before coming here, when I was in college studying for my architecture degree. It was another six years before I finally had the chance to visit the Renaissance city, but I felt at home immediately—Florence was everything I’d imagined. The book I had initially set out to write differed quite a bit from the one that was eventually published. Difficulty finding the ‘right’ travel journal and the ‘perfect’ guide had led me to the conclusion that the ideal journal or guide would be the one we each designed for ourselves—but since I knew this wasn’t practical for most of us, my idea was to create an ‘interactive travel guide’ for Florence. I wanted to provide readers with a sense of structure by offering a foundation of historical and architectural information, but at the same time allow them a large degree of flexibility to personalize the book with their own impressions, sketches and collected items. I incorporated blank pages into each chapter and designed what I called ‘Invitations’—jumping points intended to inspire creativity through writing or design exercises. While I received a lot of positive feedback on the proposal I put together (which included a fully designed mockup chapter), getting a ‘yes’ proved difficult; publishers thought the market too narrow, the commercial potential too limited. But finally, instead of responding with a polite rejection letter, one publisher asked if I would try a twist on the concept. I was able to retain the piazzas as the organizational tool and include the watercolor maps that I felt were integral to the project, but the new focus was to inspire readers through writing a narrative of my own experiences in Florence. The book grew into something beyond a historical account of the piazzas through the centuries; it’s also very much a story about finding inspiration in the natural course of daily life in a city that is very generous with its gifts.
Sunset and reflections on the Arno
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