San Michele in Foro

San Michele in Foro tickets: which one to buy

San Michele stands on the square that was the Roman forum of Lucca, in the exact centre of the old town, and it is free to enter. Nothing needs booking. Walking tours of Lucca cover this church, the oval piazza built into the shell of the Roman amphitheatre, the cathedral and the composer's birthplace a minute away, and take about two hours.

The better way to see the town, though, is by bicycle on the top of the walls, a continuous four-kilometre circuit planted with trees and used by residents as a park; rental shops sit at several of the gates and cost very little. Tower climbs are the other local speciality: two towers in the town are open, one of them with oak trees growing on the roof. Lucca is forty minutes from Pisa and Florence by train and makes a better base than either.

Visiting San Michele in Foro: what to see

The church sits where the forum stood, which is why the square around it is regular in a town of crooked lanes. The building is Romanesque of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and its front is one of the great oddities of Italian architecture: four tiers of open loggias stacked above the doorway, each column carved differently, some twisted, some inlaid, some patterned with animals and geometric bands, the whole screen built far higher than the roof behind it because the nave was never raised to match.

At the top stands a large statue of the archangel Michael with metal wings, flanked by two angels. Inside, the church is comparatively plain, with a Filippino Lippi panel of four saints in the right transept and a terracotta Madonna attributed to the della Robbia workshop. The facade sculpture was heavily restored in the nineteenth century, and the restorers put contemporary faces on some of the figures. A niche on the corner of the front holds a Madonna carved by Matteo Civitali, added as a plague offering.

San Michele in Foro opening hours and the best time to go

The church keeps a midday break and closes for services. Morning and late afternoon light both work on the front, which faces roughly west, so the afternoon is better for photographs. Lucca is busiest in summer and during the comics and games festival at the start of November, when the entire walled town is given over to costumed crowds and hotels are full; it is either the reason to come or the week to avoid.

The summer music festival brings large concerts to the squares in July. Spring and early autumn are the pleasant seasons, and the walls are at their best then. The market on Wednesday and Saturday mornings spreads outside the walls. Allow half an hour inside the church, and keep the square for an evening drink, since it is one of the best in Tuscany. The square is one of the few in Lucca wide enough to see a facade from a distance, which is how it was meant to work.