la pietra di Lecce

// The stone of Lecce
Near Lecce, there are quarries for stone that has the curious quality of being soft when taken from the ground, before gradually hardening in the heat. This made it perfect for carving the town's many facades and, combined with its location near the coast, this has secured Lecce's popularity with Italian tourists. Foreigners are rare here, even in July.

In this city of pale stone, the heat waves settle into the ground by day and wend their way over your feet, around your calves, seducitvely warming you well into the night. When the sun shines, a cool breeze chases the heat through the many piazzas and along the blazing white streets. The sun strives to burn you even in the shade, bouncing off the facades of the buildings that line every piazza.

Leccese architecture is frothy, overstated glory in the name of decadent decoration. One architect in particular is responsible for most of the exaggerated 'flair', his name was Zingalo but they called him 'Lo Zingarello' ‑ the gypsy ‑ for he tended to wander between various projects. Zingarello's facades and interiors are a lesson in exuberance. Showing a clear disdain for moderation, he sculpted the faces of cherubs spouting from the petals of flowers that adorn the forehead of other cherubs. Horses, foxes, men twist and twirl around each other with such hedonistic abandon that one wonders whether this church was built to house the cult of Bacchus, not Jesus. It's so overdone it's almost sinful.

Not to be confused with Lucca in the north, Lecce is in Puglia in Italy's south. Her inhabitants are friendly, her tourists are mostly Italian, her food is cheap and her beauty is like an aged Italian woman who wears too much lipstick.

And now that it's 6pm, my siesta is over and it's time to venture back out into the gentle caress of Lecce's lurking heat waves.