MACERATA private tour: the old town and the open-air opera house

The guided tour of Macerata will make you discover the historic center of a town with many artistic and cultural beauties for a walk full of wonders and curiosities. We start from the symbolic monument of the town, the Sferisterio, which we will visit internally, a semicircular theater unique of its kind, built in the 19th century in a neoclassical style with an elegant succession of arches and columns, a high wall and the central stage; it once hosted public sporting events while now it is used for opera performances with its extraordinary acoustics, but also jazz concerts and cultural events of various kinds.

From this splendid historic building we enter the heart of Macerata visiting the most important church, the Cathedral of San Giuliano with its characteristic unfinished facade and the Gothic-style bell tower; inside we can admire wonderful frescoes and a beautiful 18th century pipe organ. A few steps away we discover another very particular religious building, the Church of Mercy, rebuilt in the 1700s on a project by the architect Vanvitelli (author of the Royal Palace of Caserta) in Baroque-Rococo style inside which you can see beautiful paintings, stuccos and precious pink marbles.

We continue our tour admiring from the outside the University of Macerata, founded at the end of the 13th century and among the oldest in the world, and the beautiful 18th-century Buonaccorsi palace with the Civic Museums inside. Walking through the streets of the historic center, among shops and taverns with typical Marche cuisine, we explore the eighteenth-century Lauro Rossi Theater dedicated to the Macerata composer and orchestra conductor, one of the most beautiful theaters in the Marche with an elegant architecture that hosts every year musical and prose performances.

So we come in the main square, Piazza Libertà with the Civic Tower of the 16th century, 64 meters high and with the beautiful and ancient astronomical clock, an immense blue dial that indicates the hours, the phases of the moon and the carousel of the Magi in adoration of the Virgin and Child with an ingenious mechanical system of automata similar to that of Venice. On the same square we also find the Town Hall with its neoclassical façade and the Loggia dei Mercanti, where we end the guided tour, commissioned in the 16th century by the future Pope Paul II with elegant arches that housed the merchants with their shops.

Included:

• Walking tour with licensed tour guide

Not included:

• Entrance ticket to the Sferisterio
• Food and drinks
• Museum tickets (optional)
• Transfer service

What to bring:

• Comfortable shoes
• Water
• Sun hat on hot days

Meeting point:

• Piazza Nazario Sauro square ( next to the entrance to the Sferisterio )