Posts tagged ‘Spanish Steps’

Apr 9

Norms in Rome | The Spanish Steps

The Norms do enjoy a little bit of something chic, al la mode, au courant. So, when in Rome, do as the Roman high society would have you do, and go shopping in the city’s glitziest boutiques, all of which can be found in the immediate vicinity of the Spanish Steps.

The sweeping staircase of 135 steps has always had a touch of baroque glamour about it, but gained a Hollywood dazzle when it was the backdrop to Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck’s not-so-chance encounter in the 1953 epic, Roman Holiday. But even before hitting the silver screen, the staircase was the stuff of romantic legend, as it was location to the house of English Romantic poetic, John Keats, who lived and died in his house on the right side of the staircase in 1821.

Norms on the Spanish Steps (2018 © Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, pen on paper)

Naturally, the Norms feel an impulsive need to imbue themselves in the natural elegance of this area, and while they find bouncing up and down the many stairs somewhat tiresome, there can be little denying the true pleasure of both seeing, and being seen in the place that society says really does matter. No wonder the Norms are out in such large numbers to enjoy this true highlight of the Roman cityscape.

© Nicholas de Lacy-Brown and The Daily Norm, 2001-2018. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of the material, whether written work, photography or artwork, included within The Daily Norm without express and written permission from The Daily Norm’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. For more information on the artwork of Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, visit http://www.delacybrown.com

Jan 20

Natale Italiano | Rome – Day 1: Arrival by sunset

We arrived in Rome as the sun was setting behind Vatican city; the golden yellow and deepening tangerine skies casting a stunning glow behind the silhouette of St Peter’s and the domes and cupolas of ancient Rome. Our arrival to the city amongst the sun’s warm luminescence which gilded all of Rome with a hopeful uplifting lustre, was the happy ending to a transit as smooth as journeys can be – starting out by boat from the Rialto Bridge in Venice, out across a misty lagoon to the Marco Polo airport and onwards onto a swift flight down to Rome Fiumicino and a train into Stazione Termini – the happiest of starts to the second chapter of our festive Italian adventure.

Thrilled to be so swiftly and comfortably installed into the perfectly located Hotel Babuino 181, only minutes from the Spanish Steps, we left unpacking for later in our eagerness to run out onto the cobbled streets of Rome to enjoy the last rays of sun that the day was providing. After all, we had been three days in Venice with not a ray of sun to be seen, such was the density of mist which shrouded the city. But in Rome, all seemed alive under the vibrant blue skies of a winter’s afternoon sundown – hard to believe that this was Christmas Eve. For us it felt like the dying hours of a Spring day, a thought which could not escape us as we sat, but minutes later, upon the terrace of a ritzy hotel bar adjacent to the top of the Spanish steps, watching the seemingly odd combination of sunshine and vibrant mediterranean colours, with the Christmas tree which was installed onto the centre of the steps.

Dying hours of Roman sunshine

People watching on the sun-drenched Spanish steps

After indulging in the ultimate exercise of people watching in this, the classiest of Roman quarters, with a glass of prosecco in hand and a camera in the other, we headed down into the bustling streets of a Rome but hours before the feast of Christmas. In the chic shopping streets off the Via del Corso, the excitement of Christmas Eve as families and friends scuttered energetically from shop to shop was tangible, and in the nearby Piazza del Popolo, crowds hung around the grand obelisk at its centre, full of the spirit of the holiday season. For us, having a few hours spare before a dinner reservation, we headed across the square to Santa Maria del Popolo to accomplish something which I had intended to carry out when I was last in the city in 2010 but had been thwarted by renovations – to see the two stunning works by Caravaggio which can be found in a small side chapel in this otherwise innocuous church.

Like most of Caravaggio’s works, these two: the Conversion of St Paul and the Crucifixion of St Peter are utterly stunning works; Caravaggio’s exercise of chiaroscuro as dramatic as ever, while the skillful foreshortening of St Paul falling out towards us and St Peter shown foreshortened on the cross allowing audiences to become utterly absorbed in the paintings – that is at least when we could see them – for this being Rome, we had to insert a coin in a light box in order to have the otherwise shadowed works lit for all of a minute (and us being us, we had no coins on us – meaning that we had to wait for some other earnest Caravaggio fan to come along and supply lighting on our behalf…).

Caravaggio’s Popolo masterpieces