Fermo

Draped neatly over the rolling hills of Italy’s less-trodden Marche region, the tiny little commune of Fermo boasts a long and enthralling past of siege, counter siege, boom and bust alike. Consequently it now has an overload of striking attractions and supportive museums, which adorn its rustic streets in a veritable miscellany of architectural styles. There’s the grand Duomo di Fermo, standing tall since the 1200s in a mishmash of the Romanesque and the Gothic style amongst other churches and a fantastic library and art gallery centred on the Piazza del Popolo. Then there are the awesome Roman cisterns dating from as far back as the 1st century AD, and the crumbling Cyclopean walls, which protected the settlement here, even before the rise of Italy’s great empire.

However, Fermo shouldn’t just make the destination list because of its past; it should get there because it’s a veritable culture hub for the region too. Start at its excellent conglomeration of trattorias and cafes on the Piazza del Popolo, where locals sit smoking and chatting under the Adriatic sun, along with a fantastic weekend marketplace bearing the freshest Mediterranean fish, olive oils and vegetables from the fields Marche. What’s more, Fermo tour guides are also quick to highlight the city’s access to the beaches of Italy’s east coast, which finds a certain zenith at the sun-kissed stretches of the Lido di Fermo.