Your cartFlorence allows families to enjoy a path through culture because, besides the popular and amazing highlights, it offers alternative ways to learn while having fun. The pleasure of having a journey with your kids will meet the willing to know more and more about the historical background of both this city and Italy as a whole, from ancient events to modern ones.
If you don’t feel like showing your kids the Uffizi Gallery, because of its grandeur, here are some destinations more appropriate for your children:
- Stibbert Museum
- Leonardo Da Vinci
- Museo dei Ragazzi
- Boboli Garden
- The Straw Market
- Rubbing the “porcellino’s” snout
Discover our ➡️ FLORENCE KIDS TOURS
Stibbert Museum
Frederick Stibbert, an English businessman, dedicated his life to collect artworks and antiques, turning his villa in a Museum he left to the city of Florence. It contains more than 36,000 artifacts including a wide collection of armor from European, Oriental, Islamic and Japanese civilizations and lots of its walls are covered with leather and tapestries. The Stibbert museum includes also a café and a bookstore. Furthermore you can have a stroll in the English Garden next to it, to see temples – in Greek and Egyptian styles – and a greenhouse used to grow citrus trees. This museum is a real journey around the world!
Position: https://goo.gl/maps/PJRRH5oYVSw
National Archaeological Museum
If your kids are passionate about ancient history, this is the right place to visit, being one of the best equipped Italian museums. The collections include artifacts from ancient civilizations like the Etruscan, the Greek, and the Roman ones. And first of all, there is a wing full of rare and precious findings from the Egyptian civilization, the second biggest collection in Europe!
Position: https://goo.gl/maps/GYGCnm9aB5p
Leonardo Da Vinci Museum
An exhibition entirely dedicated to the genius of Leonardo Da Vinci offers a unique experience: the knowledge of Leonardo gives the perception to be immersed in the history. Forty machines invented by him are displayed inside the museum, and being full size and running, they give your kids the chance to practice Leonardo’s discoveries. The machines are made of wood and are divided into 5 main sections, including the division of the 4 elements of life, water, air, earth and fire.
Position: https://goo.gl/maps/XWhdfEHyXNq
Museo dei Ragazzi
Exactly in the core of Firenze there is “Palazzo Vecchio”, once representing the real power of Florence. Some of its rooms have been transformed into a museum center dedicated to the knowledge of kids. That is to say the "Museo dei Ragazzi", literally the museum for young people, where they can learn while attending theatrical performances, painting workshops, and events linked to reading and listening to music, events both for kids and adults. Moreover, you can jump back into the past by choosing a special tour, accompanied by a guide who will wear clothing of the Renaissance.
Position: https://goo.gl/maps/44MXbbc8DFK2
Boboli Garden
It is a garden that hosts a collection of sculptures dating back from 16th to the 18th century and some Roman antiquities. It is a real open-air museum where your kids could have fun playing hide-and-seek through statues and fountains adorning the garden! The open green space is organized in different areas: the great Amphitheatre, Neptune Fountain, Lemon house and long boulevards delimited by flowers and trees. Joining amusement and history, Boboli garden will be the right place for the whole family to agree!
Position: https://goo.gl/maps/H5F7iuGjui42
The Straw Market
Though known as "Mercato Nuovo" , literally the new market, it dates back to 11th century. The adjective “nuovo” depends from the loggia built during the 16th century, that protects merchants and shoppers from bad weather conditions. In fact under the arches numerous vendors set up shops selling belts, scarves, leather goods, embroidered linens and souvenirs. And Florentine straw hats, of course!
It is really a dynamic and vital place, also because lots of tourists frequent this market, open year-round.
Position: https://goo.gl/maps/jVWfaftF4D92
Rubbing the “porcellino’s” snout
One of the symbols of the city is a bronze fountain representing a “porcellino”, Italian term for the piglet. Originally intended for Boboli Garden, it was moved to “Mercato Nuovo” and nowadays it is the destination for lots of tourists. Visitors put a coin into the boar’s jaws, with the intent to let the coin fall through the grating lying under the boar, for good luck. The story goes that if you rub the boar’s snout you will go back to Florence for sure! Probably this tradition endures from the 18th century and due to it, the snout is the most polished part of the bronze, while the rest has a patina surrounding it.
If your kids are a little bit tired while touring, why don’t you have a break with an Italian “gelato”? I suggest the ice-cream parlor near Santa Croce, “De Neri ice-cream”, a must-visit place. They really know the secret and the recipes to make the perfect gelato, creamy and delicious. Today “De Neri Gelateria” makes one of the best home-made gelatos of Florence.
To conclude your Florence tour you can have a walk on “Ponte Vecchio”, a medieval bridge over the Arno river, popular for still having shops built along it, mainly jewelers, art dealers and souvenir sellers. Above it you can admire also the Vasari Corridor, like suspended in the air you can see a series of panoramic windows facing the Arno.
In the end, the cherry on top will be a stunning view from above: just get to “Piazzale Michelangelo” and let the series of bridges hanging up the Arno River amaze you. It will take your breath away and even your kids will be surprised!
