DAY THREE: STAY: LUXURY ART HOTEL The First Luxury Art Hotel may jar a bit on first look – the entrance features some loud artwork and a piece or two of eyebrow-raising furniture – but the artfully-conceived rooms, their tone neutral and calming in contrast to the shouty public spaces, and great-value prices (for such a central location and such genial service) make up for it, as does the roof bar, which morphs into one of the city’s top sushi restaurants in summertime. EAT: SANT’EUTACHIO The great contention among Rome aficonadoes: where’s the best coffee? Purists favor Caffe Sant’Eutachio, which is allcoffee-all-the-time: drink your faultless macchiato, buy your beans, read about the roasting, even – and admire the façade of the church of the same name while you sip. Those of a more social bent, though, can be found at Caffe della Pace, deep in the rioneof Parione, which by day is a conventional café, but by night doubles as a bar, lounge, and ground zero for flaneurs of all stripes. (The coffee, for the record, is excellent.) PLAY: PALAZZO COLONNA Until recently, you had to be a VIP to access the private galleries of the Palazzo Colonna, one of the grandest private homes in the city (Colonnas have lived here for 450 years; they’ve been Roman aristocracy for 800). It’s now open to the public, and stuffed with an artistic patrimony that anywhere else would earn it its own museum wing: Caracci, Bronzino, Tintoretto, and Veronese are just a few of the all-stars whose work graces the ornate spaces. Have your hotel concierge book ahead for a private tour on Saturday. You know you want to tool around the Eternal City on a vintage Vespa like Gregory Peck did in Roman Holiday (you know your teenager does). The folks at Scooteroma Tours know too. You can simply explore the centro storicowith a guide, or you can theme a four-hour excursion: taste pastries in Trastevere or cheese in the ghetto, for instance, or follow the trail of the film *La Grande Bellezza.*They also do Fiat 500, “ape” (a three-wheeled truck like a tuk-tuk) and bicycle tours. DRINK: STRAVINSKIJ BAR Some clichés pack a legitimate punch: on a mild Thursday or Friday evening in spring or early summer, the Stravinskij Bar at the Hotel de Russie is one of them. Sure, the drinks are fine, but that’s not what you come for: you come for the lush, terraced garden and the social networking playing out among the Roman glitterati (level of difficulty: Olympic, though of course, these being Romans, it looks effortless). EAT: MARZAPANE Venture out to the slightly snoozy, northwest-of-central Pinciano district to have a long lunch at Marzapane: the tasting menus – one of meat, one of fish – draw the likes of former mayor Walter Veltroni, who’s a regular, as well as the city’s top food critics, who all rave about its elevated versions of maialino and carbonara. Amazing Destinations 141
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