Uffizi Gallery, Florence

The Uffizi is the most important and visited museum in Florence. The Uffizi palace was designed and begun in 1560 by the architect Giorgio Vasari in the period when Cosimo de' Medici, first Grand Duke of Tuscany, was bureaucratically consolidating his recent takeover of power. Built in the shape of a horseshoe extending from Piazza della Signoria to the Arno River and linked by a bridge over the street with Palazzo Vecchio, the Uffizi were intended to house the administrative offices (uffizi) of the Grand Duchy. From the beginning, however, the Medici set aside a few rooms on the third floor to house the finest works of their collections. The Gallery was subsequently enriched by various members of the Medici family. Two centuries later, in 1737, the palace and their collection were left to the city by Anna Maria Luisa, the last Medici heir, and today houses one of the world's great art galleries.

The beauty of going to Florence in February is that you can be in one of the most important art museums in the world with almost no people. We got reservations (which were completely unnecessary at this time of year) for early morning to aid and abet our ability to view the Bottichelli and Titian rooms with a minimum of crowds, and we were very successful--there were more guards than museum goers for our two hours in the museum. The whole visit was incredible. The grandeur of the setting did the art justice, and while we had not idea who any of the hundreds of portraits that line the Uffizzi's halls depicted, we were impressed by their volume. And The Birth of Venus is worth the price of admission.