10 Best Sights in Ravello, The Amalfi Coast

Ravello's first bishop, Orso Papiciò, founded this cathedral in 1086. Rebuilt in the 12th and 17th centuries, it retains traces of medieval frescoes in the transept, a marble portal, and a three-story 13th-century bell tower playfully interwoven with mullioned windows and arches. The 12th-century bronze door has 54 embossed panels depicting Christ's life, and saints, prophets, plants, and animals, all narrating biblical lore. Ancient columns divide the nave's three aisles, and treasures include sarcophagi from Roman times and paintings by the southern Renaissance artist Andrea da Salerno. Most impressive are the two medieval pulpits: the earlier one (on your left as you face the altar) is inset with a mosaic scene of Jonah and the whale, symbolizing death and redemption. The more famous one opposite was commissioned by Nicola Rufolo in 1272 and created by Niccolò di Bartolomeo da Foggia, with exquisite mosaic work, bas-reliefs, and six twisting columns sitting on lion pedestals. An eagle grandly tops the inlaid marble lectern.

A chapel to the left of the apse is dedicated to San Pantaleone, a physician beheaded in the 3rd century in Nicomedia. Every July 27, devout believers gather in hopes of witnessing a miracle (similar to that of San Gennaro in Naples), in which the saint's blood, collected in a vial and set out on an inlaid marble altar, appears to liquefy and come to a boil.

In the crypt is the Museo del Duomo, which displays religious treasures, including many from the 13th century during the reign of Frederick II of Sicily.

To the south of Ravello's main square, a somewhat hilly 15-minute walk along Via San Francesco brings you to Ravello's showstopper, the Villa Cimbrone, whose dazzling gardens perch 1,500 feet above the sea. This medieval-style fantasy was created in 1905 by England's Lord Grimthorpe and made world-famous in the 1930s when Greta Garbo found sanctuary from the press here. The Gothic castello-palazzo sits amid idyllic gardens that are divided by the grand Avenue of Immensity pathway, leading in turn to the literal high point of any trip to the Amalfi Coast—the Belvedere of Infinity. This grand stone parapet, adorned with stone busts, overlooks the entire Bay of Salerno and frames a panorama that the late writer Gore Vidal, a longtime Ravello resident, described as the most beautiful in the world. The villa itself is now a five-star hotel.

Directly off Ravello's main piazza is the Villa Rufolo, home to enchanting gardens, many of which frame a stunning vista of the Bay of Salerno. If the master storyteller Boccaccio is to be believed, the villa was built in the 13th century by Landolfo Rufolo, whose immense fortune stemmed from trade with the Moors and the Saracens. Norman and Arab architecture mingle in a welter of color-filled gardens so lush the composer Richard Wagner used them as inspiration for Klingsor's Garden, the home of the Flower Maidens, in his opera Parsifal. Beyond the Arab-Sicilian cloister and the Norman tower lie the two terrace gardens. The lower one, the "Wagner Terrace," is often the site for Ravello Festival concerts, with the orchestra perched on a platform constructed over the precipice. Sir Francis Nevile Reid, a Scotsman, acquired the villa in 1851 and hired Michele Ruggiero, head of the excavations at Pompeii, to restore the villa to its full splendor and replant the gardens with rare cycads, cordylines, and palms. Highlights of the house are its Moorish cloister—an Arabic-Sicilian delight with interlacing lancet arcs and polychromatic palmette decoration—and the 14th-century Torre Maggiore, the so-called Klingsor's Tower, renamed in honor of Richard Wagner's landmark 1880 visit.

Crowning Via della Repubblica and the hillside, which overlooks the spectacular Bay of Salerno, Auditorium Oscar Niemeyer is a startling piece of modernist architecture. Designed with a dramatically curved, all-white roof by the Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer, it was conceived as an alternative indoor venue for concerts, including those of the famed Ravello Festival of music and arts, and a program of winter concerts featuring jazz. The subject of much controversy since its first conception back in 2000, it raised the wrath of some locals who denounced such an ambitious modernist building in medieval Ravello. They need not have worried: the result, inaugurated in 2010, is a design masterpiece—a huge canopied roof suspended over a 400-seat concert area, with a giant eye-shaped window allowing spectators to contemplate the extraordinary bay vista during performances. Although open only during concerts and events, it is worth visiting to admire not only the architecture but also the impressive views from the large terrace, which is also a scenic setting for art exhibitions during the Ravello Festival.

A onetime bishop's residence that dates from at least the 12th century, the Villa Episcopio (formerly Villa di Sangro) today hosts concerts and exhibitions and has an open-air theater in its splendid gardens—the same gardens where André Gide found inspiration for his novel The Immoralist, where Italy's King Vittorio Emanuele III abdicated in favor of his son in 1944, and where Jackie Kennedy enjoyed breaks from her obligations as First Lady during a much publicized 1962 visit. Wheelchair access is via a new ramp on via San Giovanni del Toro.

To the left of the Duomo, the entrance to this private museum is through the tempting shop CAMO, and both are the creation of master-craftsman-in-residence Giorgio Filocamo. The museum celebrates the venerable tradition of Italian workmanship in coral, harvested in bygone centuries from the gulfs of Salerno and Naples and crafted into jewelry, cameos, and figurines. The fascinating collection, not confined solely to coral work, includes a painting of Sisto IV from the 14th century. Look also in particular for a carved Christ from the 17th century, for which the J. Paul Getty Museum offered $525,000 in 1987 (the offer was refused), and a tobacco box covered in cameos, one of only two in the world. There is also a statue of the Madonna dating to 1532. Giorgio has crafted coral for Pope John Paul II, the Clintons, and Princess Caroline, as well as numerous Hollywood stars.

Below the Hotel Parsifal in the center of a traffic circle stand two stone lions on a fanciful 1,000-year-old fountain that still spews water into a ciborium basin taken from the Duomo. Unfortunately, the lions are reproductions; the originals were stolen years ago. Just beyond the fountain along Via Lacco there's a viewpoint taking in the coastline and down the valley to the town of Maiori.

Across the tiny piazza from the Hotel Caruso is the noted 11th-century church of San Giovanni del Toro. Its evocative interior has three high apses and a crypt with 14th-century frescoes of Christ and the apostles. A 12th-century ambo (pulpit) by Alfano da Termoli startles the eye with its blue Persian majolica and four columns topped with elaborate capitals. The chapel of the Coppola family in the left aisle has an exceptional 14th-century relief of St. Catherine of Alexandria. The small church's three porticos adorned with lunettes show an Arabian influence, and the tripartite back facade is exquisite. Restoration work on the church commenced in 2003, with no sign of being completed. The church has some erratic summer opening hours; inquire about them at the Duomo or Azienda Autonoma Soggiorno e Turismo.

A 13th-century church with a graceful dome, Santa Maria a Gradillo was where the town noblemen gathered to discuss civic issues; its atrium collapsed in the 18th century. The small Sicilian--Saracenic bell tower has two light mullion windows. Ask about the church's most current opening hours at Duomo or Azienda Autonoma Soggiorno e Turismo.

With its oft-photographed bell towers and scenic location below Villa Rufolo, the deconsecrated church of Santissima Annunziata is one of Ravello's most recognizable features, dating from the 13th century, when it was constructed for the wealthy Fusco family. The adjoining oratory was the 15th-century seat of the flagellating Confraternity of Battent. The church is generally closed to the public except for special events, such as performances by chamber orchestras. For an up-close look at the exterior, exit the Villa Rufolo and take a sharp right to reach the Via dell'Annunziata stair path, which plummets you down the hillside right past the church and to the scenic Via della Repubblica.