Shirtmaker Simone Abbarchi

The Premio Rezzori literary prize — held every May in Florence — is named after the Austrian writer Gregor von Rezzori, who lived for years in the small village of Donnini, east of the city, with his aristocratic wife, Beatrice Monte della Corte. Von Rezzori died some years ago but his formidable wife, now 92, is the doyenne of Florentine literary life and in the first week of May I was summoned by her from distant Bangkok, where I live, in order to be one of five finalists deposited in the Hotel Porta Rossa and groomed on how to behave at an awards ceremony to be held three days later in the Palazzo Vecchio.

The other four of our merry band were George Saunders, David Szalay, Katie Kitamura and Andreï Makine. Margaret Atwood and her husband were there as well. An illustrious cohort, admittedly, and one not disfigured by rivalries, even after we discovered that George had won. But I was nevertheless soon waylaid by other obsessions.

I spent a lot of my childhood in Florence, thanks to a godmother in Fiesole, but the city’s charms have, for me, long declined. The tour groups from Harbin led by little flags have become the new icon of a city sinking into tourist depravity. Only the ice cream and the buildings remain. However, I remembered something about the warren of vaulted alleys just behind the Porta Rossa which had remained lodged in my unconscious.

On a parallel street accessed from the hotel’s back door lies the legendary shirt maker Simone Abbarchi, whose elegant and timeless shop is lodged in the ancient Roman baths, the Antiche Terme, and moreover lies at the edge of a small oblong piazza with the fantastical name of Piazza del Limbo.