Medici Villas - Last day in Florence

NM: Today, June 27^th, our class visited two different Medici Villas in Florence. Today marks the last day I’ll spend in Florence for a long time, but I know I’ll be back someday. The Medici Villas both contained characteristics of Italian Renaissance gardens, having symmetry, citrus fruits, and a terraced (containing levels) approach to the garden itself. Both of the Medici Villas that we visited today, as with almost all of the Medici Villas, were built on preexisting military structures so that the Medici’s themselves wouldn’t have to spend time fortifying their residences. The first Medici Villa is know known as the Bran Academy, although it does not any longer pertain to horticulture purposes (Bran is the material around the seed of a plant that must be removed for the plant to grow). The Bran Academy studies language and perceptions of language, and the hold that for language to be understood correctly you have to remove the unwanted things like slang, holding true to the notion of the world Bran. The first Medici Villa was also home to the “Real Jasmine” as opposed to the Jasmine that is grown in Texas. The above picture is of the wormwood plant, which is used to make absinthe, a hallucinogenic alcoholic drink. This blog is actually bittersweet, for it will be my last post of our amazing trip. I’d love to publicly thank Dr. Lombardini and Dr. Wilborn for this life changing experience.