just a note for those wanting to take a tour of the city: avoid the south of italy in august if you want to avoid sweltering heat, swollen everything, and instant dehydration. it is an awesome place to visit, any other time of the year.

Swollen *everything*?? Ohmy.

You know, if I had my own place with cement floors, I'd be tempted to do a flooring repainting based on some of these Herculaneum designs. They're gorgeous, and I don't think they'd be tough to hack with the help of some decent flooring paint and blue painter's tape.

Also, @partick (the other one)? You make me smile.

The worst traffic jam we were ever in was one Easter Saturday, at 5:30 pm trying to drive into Sorrento. It took 3 hours to go 5 kms!!!! It was insane.

But otherwise, April is a lovely time of year to go...

Herculaneum is awesome ! it's amazing how well preserved some of the stuff there is. I enjoyed it much more than Pompeii as it was also much less crowded. Felt free to stage plenty of goofy pictures with this amazing backdrop of preserved history.

And the huge ceramic pots there (those things were sturdy!!) still inspire me. ahhh, happy times

wow - I'd definitely live here. the designers have done such an amazing job with their faux work and brilliantly created that distressed look. the open quality is really amazing, i'd love to get the name of the architects. so great when designers can create something that is so real seeming, I mean it looks like an actual ruin! it's all about the details ;)

They could use some carbonized Eames' Loungers for staging. And a "Keep calm and carry on" fresco, in Latin.

And a "Keep calm and carry on" fresco, in Latin.

How about "perfer et obdura" (a quote from the Roman poet Ovid, meaning more or less "carry through and stay strong")?

I'd love to have frescoes painted in my apartment, but it'd probably be too pricey. I'm definitely considering a mosaic on the shower floor when I redo my bathroom, though (as a bonus, I hear mosaic tiles are less slippery than big ones because of the grout between them).

@ patrick ok, i had that coming ;)
and sorrento is great... there was this street market i went through, with the most beautifully styled stalls, if they had an anthropologie stylist it couldn't have been as perfect...
i also enjoyed pozzuoli, where sofia loren was born... it was so idylic, a perfect mediterranean-romantic place...
the thing i remember best though is me and my dad jumping over a church garden wall so as not to have to walk an extra interminable block in napoli... that was fun!

I could kick myself for not having ventured south when I was in Italy. The next place on my list to go.