Trattoria Dardano
Order the pici al ragù. Bring cash. Bring an appetite. Skip dessert and walk to the gelateria across the piazza.
No tourist traps. Our Italian friends each leave exactly three recommendations: one place to eat, one to see, one museum to lose a morning in. Signed and dated.

Designer. Born here. Knows which trattoria still hand-rolls the pici.
Order the pici al ragù. Bring cash. Bring an appetite. Skip dessert and walk to the gelateria across the piazza.
Walk up at sunrise. Franciscan, austere, cypresses everywhere. The path smells like rosemary and warm stone.
Etruscan bronzes. Tiny, perfect, no queue. Tuesday mornings the curator gives unprompted tours.
Sommelier. Drives a Vespa with a baguette on the back, unironically.
Lunch only. Bistecca alla fiorentina. Share a table with strangers; that's the point.
Skip the Uffizi for a morning. Stand under Michelangelo's tombs in the empty room at opening.
Donatello's wooden Magdalene will undo you. Allow an hour you won't remember.
Photographer. Will be ours, on the day. Knows the city by its keyholes.
Trastevere, in a courtyard. Order the focaccia. Order another focaccia. Stay for the negroni.
The view of St. Peter's framed by a hedge, through an iron keyhole. Go at 7am. You will be alone.
Book three weeks ahead. Bernini's marble. Once you've seen the Daphne, you've seen everything.
One place to eat, one to see, one museum. No chains. No Tripadvisor. Just the thing you would tell your favourite cousin.