Glance, Florence, Italy

A 1950s building designed by Italo Gamberini in the middle of Florence has been renovated by local outfit AMDB Studio’s Daniela Bianchi into Glance, a swanky, modern 69-room boutique hotel. 

The interventions have been subtle, aided, in part by the well-conceived bones of the original design, though perhaps Bianchi’s most remarkable achievement was the insertion of a small swimming pool on the rooftop, an unusual enough feature for Florentine hotels, much less one this small.

The public spaces and rooms are furnished entirely by Lema, the Italian outfit providing customised tables and counterspaces alongside choice pieces from its Lema Casa collection, such as the free-forming Cloud sofa by Francesco Rota, coffee tables by Studio Kairos, and poufs by Officinadesign Lema.

The absence of an in-house restaurant is perhaps an indication of the hotel’s rating, but what of it. In Florence, it is an obtuse diner who goes hungry. On this point, it’s worth nothing that the hotel’s location in the San Lorenzo quarter can barely be bettered – the Accademia, Uffizi, Santa Maria Novella station, and the Duomo are all within striking distance, though it’s tempting to just loll indolently by the rooftop pool while contemplating the elegant lines of the Medici chapel.