Bologna travel guides & articles
All 13 in-depth pieces we’ve published on Bologna — newest first.
Tours & tickets
Where to Roll Tagliatelle by Hand in Bologna
Seven places in and around Bologna teach the sfoglia, and the Quadrilatero counters tell you whether yours came out right.
Tours & tickets
Bologna's Piazza Maggiore in October, Hour by Hour
What Bologna's main square is really like in October, and how to spend a day there without paying for a view that no longer exists.
Tours & tickets
Bologna Never Finished San Petronio Basilica
Europe's largest brick church is free to walk into, its floor carries the world's biggest indoor sundial, and the best delis in Bologna are ninety seconds away.
Red Bologna: The Last Communist City in Western Europe
Beyond the towers and the tortellini, Bologna's murals, co-op supermarkets and self-managed social centres still carry the political identity that earned it the name La Rossa.
The Best Food Tours in Bologna
Ten tours that actually earn their fee — from a 7am producer run through Parmigiano country to a backstreet crescione crawl — honestly ranked for couples, groups and cooks.
Parmesan, Prosciutto, and Gold: A Day in Bologna's Food Valley
The porticoes get the postcards, but the real Bologna is out on the plain — where Parmigiano is formed at dawn, balsamic ages for a quarter-century in attic barrels, and the ragù is finally worth the drive.
Bologna's Leaning Towers and the Rivalry That Built Them
The tallest one is shut, the crooked one is in a steel corset, and the family feud behind both is still legible three streets in every direction. Here is how to read the towers in 2026.
Life Under the Arches: Bologna's 40 Kilometres of Porticoes
A walking guide to the only city on earth built to be crossed dry — from the pilgrim's climb to San Luca to the working-class arches most visitors never reach.
Tours & tickets
Standing Under Bologna's Medieval Merchant Court
The loggia at Palazzo della Mercanzia is free, open to the street, and worth about ten minutes on its own; a short walk nearby is what makes it legible.
Tours & tickets
The last open stretch of Bologna's canal, seen from via Piella
Bologna's mill canal surfaces for one short run behind the houses, and the free window that frames it takes five minutes of patience at the wrong hour.
Bologna's Medieval Race to Build the World's First Skyscrapers
Nine centuries after rival families built brick towers to outrank each other, only one of Bologna's original skyscrapers can still be climbed. Here's the full vertical history, tower by tower.
Bologna's Hunger: How Food Built the Soul of the City
A local writer's honest, plate-by-plate guide to eating in Bologna la Grassa — from the city's most obsessive ragù to a 1465 wine tavern where you bring your own dinner.
Bologna's Buried Canals, Traced From Street to Tunnel
Beneath Bologna's porticoes runs the silk-trade canal network the city spent a century burying, and this is where it still surfaces, above ground and below.