Central Apartment on Via Elisa, Lucca

The apartment is a bright, well-kept apartment for two on the first floor of a building on Via Elisa, inside Lucca's Renaissance walls. It is 34 square metres: compact, carefully organised, and genuinely light. The large windows look directly onto the street — not a courtyard, not a roofline, but the actual life of Via Elisa: neighbours on bicycles, the local alimentari opening its shutters, the particular morning quiet of a residential street inside an ancient city.

The double bedroom is comfortable. The kitchen is fully equipped — coffee machine, hob, microwave, fridge, everything you need for a proper stay rather than just a stopover. The bathroom has a shower and bidet. WiFi throughout. Iron and ironing board. All the details attended to.

Children are welcome. Pets are welcome. The building has no elevator — one flight of stairs to the first floor. If mobility is a concern, please get in touch before booking.

The Street

Via Elisa is one of those streets that repays attention. It runs through a genuinely residential part of Lucca's historic centre — inside the walls, away from the main tourist circuits, with local shops, small restaurants, and the kind of unhurried daily life that most people come to Italy hoping to find and rarely do.

At one end, Porta San Gervasio: the medieval gate of 1255, with its towers and arch and frescoes, largely unknown to visitors, entirely present to anyone who lives on the street. The gate was one of four original entrances through Lucca's medieval fortifications; only this one and the Porta dei Borghi at the far end of Via Fillungo survive. From the top of the towers, connected by a walkway, the view over the city's rooftops is one of the best in Lucca — and almost always uncrowded.

At the other end, the Renaissance walls: Lucca's famous four-kilometre circuit of 16th-century fortifications, wide enough to drive a carriage on, now planted with plane trees and used by residents for their morning walks, evening runs, and Sunday bicycle rides. The walls are one of the great pleasures of the city, and from Via Elisa you reach them in under two minutes.

Getting Around

Lucca's historic centre is fully pedestrian within the walls. From Via Elisa, the whole city is reachable on foot. Piazza Anfiteatro is a 10-minute walk. The Cathedral of San Martino is 12 minutes. Via Fillungo and Piazza San Michele are about 15 minutes. The train station is 15 minutes on foot, with direct connections to Pisa (30 min), Florence (1h 20min) and the Versilia coast.

For day trips: Pisa in 30 minutes by train. The Garfagnana valley — rugged, barely touristed, extraordinary — begins just north of the city. The Versilia Riviera, Forte dei Marmi and Viareggio, is under 40 minutes by car. Tourist car parks are available just outside the walls; ZTL restrictions apply within the historic centre.