Visiting Lucca: The Walls, the Towers, and Why It’s Worth a Full Day

Lucca is a walled city in western Tuscany that most visitors skip in favour of Florence or Siena. The 4.2-kilometre circuit of Renaissance walls — intact, walkable, cycleable on top — encloses one of the best-preserved medieval centres in Italy: narrow streets, Roman-era piazzas, Romanesque churches, and a pace that the city’s better-known neighbours lost decades ago. Here is what makes it worth a full day.

The Walls

Lucca’s walls were built between 1504 and 1645 — not a restoration of the medieval fortifications, but an entirely new Renaissance circuit engineered to resist artillery. They were never breached, and more unusually, never demolished when the city modernised in the 19th century. That decision preserved both the walls and the medieval street plan inside them.

The full circuit is 4.2 kilometres and runs completely flat. Walking it takes about an hour; cycling takes around 30 minutes. The path on top is wide, tree-lined with mature oaks and chestnuts, and used every day by the local population as a park and running track. Bicycle hire is available at each of the city gates. The walls have 11 bastions, each slightly different in design; several of the interiors now host exhibitions and public events.

The Towers

Lucca once had around 130 towers — each built in the 12th or 13th century as a display of family wealth and power, when the city was one of the wealthiest silk-trading centres in Europe. Almost all were demolished. Two significant ones remain.

The Torre Guinigi is the more memorable: a 14th-century tower built by the city’s ruling family and topped with a hanging garden of holm oak trees that have been growing from the roof terrace for centuries. The trees are visible from street level and are, by any account, an unusual sight in the middle of a medieval city. The climb — 230 steps — takes about five minutes and the view from the top covers the whole walled city, the plain beyond, and the Apuan Alps to the north. The Torre delle Ore (clock tower) has been marking time for the city since 1390; it is slightly taller than the Guinigi tower and also open to visitors.

The Piazzas

Piazza dell’Anfiteatro is the most distinctive space in the city. The oval shape follows the seating tiers of the original Roman amphitheatre, dismantled in the medieval period and its stones repurposed — but the outline of the tiers survived in the foundations of the buildings constructed on top. The result is a perfectly oval medieval piazza with narrow arched entrances at each end. It is the city’s main aperitivo square and one of the most architecturally peculiar public spaces in Tuscany.

Piazza San Michele has one of the finest Romanesque church facades in Tuscany — an ornate marble arcade climbing to the archangel on the rooftop. The Cathedral of San Martino nearby contains the Volto Santo, a wooden crucifix that has been venerated in Lucca since the 8th century and is the focus of the city’s most important religious procession each September. Lucca has more churches per square kilometre than almost anywhere in Tuscany; most are open and free to enter.

Festivals

Lucca has a festival calendar that is genuinely local in origin rather than tourist-facing. The Summer Festival runs through July with outdoor concerts in Piazza Napoleone — the lineup has consistently included major international acts. The Puccini Festival is held in July and August at Torre del Lago, 20 minutes from the city; Puccini was born in Lucca in 1858 and the house in Corte San Lorenzo is now a small museum. Lucca Comics and Games, held in late October and early November, is the largest comics and gaming festival in Europe — the city fills with cosplay and the event draws around 250,000 visitors over five days. The Luminara di Santa Croce on 13 September is a candlelit procession through the city streets accompanying the Volto Santo: one of the most atmospheric medieval religious ceremonies still observed in Italy.

Food

Lucca’s food is specific to the city and the Garfagnana valley to the north — buccellato (the aniseed and raisin ring bread sold at Pasticceria Taddeucci since 1881), biroldo (a spiced blood sausage unique to the Lucca area), tordelli lucchesi (pasta parcels with a meat and herb filling), and DOP olive oil from the Lucchesia hills. For what to eat, where to find it, and the city’s markets, see the Lucca food guide. For visitors from Emilia-Romagna, the Parmigiano Reggiano production zone is about 90 minutes north — a dairy visit from Lucca makes a coherent add-on to a longer stay.

Planning a Visit

Lucca is 22 km from Pisa (30 minutes by regional train, frequent services all day), 70 km from Florence (around 1 hour 20 minutes by train), and under an hour from La Spezia. The historic centre is entirely walkable; a half-day covers the walls and towers, a full day adds the churches, piazzas, Puccini museum, and a proper lunch. For a comparison of Lucca and Pisa as bases or day trips, see Pisa vs. Lucca. For cruise visitors arriving at La Spezia, our Lucca shore excursion covers the walled centre with food tastings and return transport to the port.