Location
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| Tour of the Florence office & classrooms. |
The art and history of the Italian Renaissance can be studied many places. Only in Florence does the rich interaction between Medieval Europe and classical antiquity – the embodiment of the Renaissance – truly come alive. Wandering through the winding streets and famous piazze, visitors are struck by the harmonious blending of medieval public buildings, Renaissance churches and swirling baroque decoration. Prestigious museums, such as the Uffizi, also provide unmatched resources for the study of painting, architecture and sculpture. Nestled along the Arno river and less than 150 miles from both Rome and Venice, Florence (or Firenze) is ideally situated in the heart of Italy's Tuscany region.
The Florence program office and classrooms are centrally-located in the city, within a five-minute walk of Santa Maria Novella (Florence's main train station). Important sites such as the Duomo, the Uffizi, Piazza della Signoria, and the Ponte Vecchio are also within easy walking distance. The academic program is located on the fourth floor of a historic 19th-century building, and shares space with Linguaviva, the language school that the program works with for Italian instruction. Linguaviva has been honored with multiple Star Awards from Language Travel Magazine and has received the Excellence Award in numerous years from LanguageCourse S.L. There are classrooms, office space, a library (with many of the reference materials catalogued online), and a student study area. The building is also the site of the pensione that students stay in upon their arrival in Florence, before moving in with their host families. A great deal of the program takes place outside the office space – with the guidance of their instructors, students view famous art works in galleries, museums, churches and public buildings. They examine Florentine architecture, travel to other Italian cities, and experience modern Italian culture as they study colloquial Italian and live in Italian homes.