Will you marry “moi” ?

Sure, Paris is chic and romantic, but here are some other French regions that also have storybook wedding locales. Continue reading

Whatever your definition of Provence is from the exceptional fabrics of Provence that you decorate your home with or the lavish “Savon de Marseilles” that you treat yourself to in the bath or where its exact boundaries are, one thing we can all agree upon, Provence is a very special land of extraordinary variety and sublime beauty. It encompasses dramatic landscape, fierce, rock-strewn plateaux, incredible deep gorges, mellow pasture-land, vineyards, olive groves, lavender and sunflower fields, salt marshes and the coastal strip with its lush Mediterranean vegetation. Provence is bathed in miraculously clear light; and hence the landscape that has inspired brilliance in both writers and artists for centuries. Continue reading

Tuscany’s beauty is matched by only a few places on Earth. The region is a natural marvel of ever-changing scenery from golden meadows of sunflowers with cypress trees on the horizon, green rolling hills, dusty grey olive groves and the glistening waters of the seas under an azure sky. But Tuscany is more than sweeping countryside, as its villages and spectacular hilltop towns also contribute to its distinctive character.

Film-makers have long been enchanted by Tuscany. We all remember James Ivory’s “A room with a View”; this was a huge success which launched the region to stardom. There are many other movies featuring locations in Tuscany or Italy. The most obvious is “Under the Tuscan Sun” or the interior Florence scenes in “Tea and Mussolini” and the award winning “Life is Beautiful” with Roberto Benigni who has become the most beloved comic-actor in the world. And let’s not forget the region’s foremost and gifted Tenor, Andrea Bocelli whose voice has been praised as the most beautiful in the world.

Florence or Firenze is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany. A centre of medieval European trade and finance, this city is also considered the birthplace and “cradle of Renaissance” (la culla del Rinascimento) for its monuments, churches and buildings. It was long under the de facto rule of the Medici family who were also bankers to the Pope which contributed to their rise.

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