Experience the cradle of the Renaissance in a new light at Florence’s W hotel

Florence is one of the great capitals of the Old World, home to breathtaking landmarks that span the Romanesque to the Renaissance. Widely regarded as the cradle of that era, it was here that the Medici family funded Michelangelo, Brunelleschi and Galileo, turning the city into an artistic, banking and intellectual engine.

W Florence, however, is new. Opened in July 2025 as Italy’s second W (after Rome), the hotel represents Florence’s new wave of design-forward, lifestyle-oriented institutions. It’s a counterpoint to the city’s gilded but ageing grandes dames, yet unmistakably channels the creative spirit of its host – while maintaining the international polish of a Marriott brand.

Wallpaper* checks in at W Florence

What's on your doorstep?

Its location may be one of W Florence’s greatest draws: it sits on Piazza dell’Unità Italiana, bang in the centre of the city. Florence is eminently walkable, and from here you’re mere steps from the Duomo, Santa Maria Novella and the Medici Chapel. We also found ourselves seduced by Florence’s subtler pleasures: affogato standing at the counter of Café Gilli and drifting in and out of antiques shops in crowd-free Santo Spirito.

Who is behind the design?

W Florence occupies a building designed between 1968 and 1972 by architect Lando Bartoli; after decades of neglect, it was restored by Genius Loci Architettura (GLA). In a city stacked with medieval and Renaissance ornamentation, Bartoli’s rationalist-modernist structure – with its stone façade, slender windows and burnished bronze elements – stands apart. It is one of Florence’s few visible examples of 20th-century architecture.

The brand new interiors, by design firm AvroKO, draw heavily from the 1960s and 1970s, expressed through geometric forms, sculptural furniture and moody lighting (the initiated may also spot gestures toward Italian design greats like Joe Colombo). The spaces quietly reference Florence’s artistic heritage, through graphic flooring and curved banquettes. The palette also echoes the city in notes of Boboli Garden green and Medici red, and a vast Adam Ellis Studio mural – a ‘Florentine Babylon Garden’ of tigers, peacocks and monkeys, a reference to the Medici menagerie – greets guests in reception.

The room to book

The hotel has 119 rooms, including 16 suites and a penthouse. Our Superior Twin felt comfortable yet elevated, with marble accents, terrazzo-inspired surfaces, and deliberately mismatched art. A striking light installation above the bed uses mirrors and integrated LEDs to create the illusion of infinite receding arches – a nod to Florence’s vaulted landmarks, from Palazzo Pitti to the Vasari Corridor. A stylish semicircular cabinet houses the minibar, complete with – naturally – negronis, the drink having been born in Florence.

The penthouse expands upon these signatures, but it's the 140 sq m private terrace that sets it apart. On a November evening tour, the vantage point revealed stacks of orange-lit windows, each offering a vignette of Florentine life, while the illuminated Duomo rose, magnificently close, through the darkness. In summer, the terrace must be a blessed escape from the sweltering streets. The same goes for the hotel’s Zefiro Rooftop, named for the Greek god of the west wind, depicted in Botticelli’s Birth of Venus, which resides in Florence's Uffizi Gallery.

Staying for drinks and dinner?

At the hotel’s main restaurant, Tratto – run by the team behind the Michelin-starred Trattoria Contemporanea near Lake Como – graphic menu covers announce that this is ‘Italian contemporary food’. This means grilled Chinese cabbage with kimchi sauce and peanut butter, veal tripe stew with mint and pecorino, and squid skewers with bell pepper and nduja mayo. There’s not a slice of pizza on the premises, but we did try a simple but oh-so-effective egg pasta with lemon, butter and Parmesan and a cream-forward tiramisù from a dessert trolley curated by one of the country’s rising pastry stars. A second restaurant, Akira Back – named for the Korean-American chef with a global portfolio of 28 restaurants – opens soon, bringing his ‘new Asian’ sensibility to W Florence.

In the W Lounge, where a blue lava stone bar meets wiggly banquettes in velvet and boucle, the cocktail menu is helpfully illustrated so you know whether to expect a coupe or a highball. Like Tratto, the bar takes something familiar and twists it – a negroni with a whisper of coconut, or a gimlet with a salty foam (a nod to the Florentine explorer Amerigo Vespucci).

Where to switch off

W Florence is less about switching off than switching on – though, for some, that’s the same thing. It’s a hotel for extroverts, deliberately functioning as a social hub where hospitality, nightlife and cultural programming blur. The epicentre is the W Lounge and its neighbouring central courtyard, a flexible space designed for fashion shows, performances or private events, reinforcing W’s identity as a lifestyle venue and echoing Florence’s cultural vitality of centuries past.

Traditional relaxation-seekers may be left wanting: the hotel doesn’t have a full spa, but it does have a wellness area with a sauna, steam bath, relaxation room and 24-hour gym.

Service with a smile?

The staff are enthusiastic, engaged and effortlessly cool. Their uniforms – utility trousers, boxy shirts and Pucci scarves – are another example of the W’s update on ‘made in Italy’ style.

The verdict

Florence is increasingly embracing contemporary expression and experimental design, and the W is an embodiment of that shift. It captures a duality: travellers still want art, architecture, pasta and gelato, and the hotel provides all of that – just not in the way you expect. And when you’re ready to lose yourself in the cradle of the Renaissance, it’s all right on your doorstep.

W Florence is located at Piazza dell'Unità Italiana, 4/B, Via del Melarancio, 1, 50123 Firenze FI, Italy.