Firenze has a reputation for being a centre of leather goods. And you will certainly find a very large number of leather goods stores in the city. Now, how many of those are selling products by genuine Italian artisans, and how many are selling genuine high-quality leather; well, that's the issue, isn't it?

I should really have done some more research before going here. Needless to say, on our coach trip our first stop was a leather store. (Not this one.) On coach tours the world over, you can guarantee that you will be deposited into a favoured store in exchange for a few backhanders. I'm not necessarily passing judgement on this; everyone who takes a package tour knows that it happens (or if they don't, they certainly should) and in some cases the goods are quite serviceable. They may even be decent value for money, though since you're a clueless tourist in a strange land on a tight schedule, you're probably not in the best position to compare.

I did indeed find a leather jacket that I really liked the style of at the store that we were deposited into. However it was brown rather than my preferred black. Nonetheless, it did seem to be a genuine Italian made jacket in a style that appeal to me greatly, so I bought it. I still think that it's a nice jacket in a nice style, but if I had my time over again I probably wouldn't have made the purchase. I knew that we were coming back to Firenze a couple of weeks later, so I may have had a 2nd bite at the cherry then had I wanted it. Of course, our tour guide and driver would have missed out on their cut of the action had I done that and heaven knows they get paid little enough as it is.

Short version, I still haven't actually worn the jacket out because I rarely dress in a brown colour scheme, or something which is compatible with brown. More black and/or blue, me. Also, I was slugged with the sales tax because I could not get the invoice stamped on departure from Europe since we left from Switzerland at the end of the trip, and Switzerland is not part of the EU. I therefore paid quite a bit more than I should have for a jacket that I still like but have thus far had no service from. (I'm less concerned about that than you might think. My existing black leather jacket is extremely well worn, but it took me about 3 years before I started wearing the thing.)

If I had my time over, I probably would have come to take a look at this place, since the reviews on Google are very positive. And most of them aren't even written by One-Review Ollies. There is something disconcerting about having people outside a store touting for business, but I don't think that they were doing that in most of the shops here in the Piazza di Santa Croce. It makes sense to have someone positioned outside if you going to have stock outside the store as well to entice customers in, and certainly it does no harm to have someone who can talk with any potential passing customers. I would have liked to have seen what they had to offer.

Maybe next time, if I ever pass that way again.