Livorno in 3D: a boat tour of the canals, the fortresses and the sea
An interactive map of Livorno to explore by motorboat: sail along the Medici canals, pass under the bridge-squares, reach the Terrazza Mascagni and the Meloria shoals. In every place you discover its story.
If you can see this text, your browser cannot show the 3D version: below you will still find all the stories of the places.
MagicMetrics
Who built this harbour
This project
This boat tour of Livorno is an example of what can be done today with 3D right in the browser: no app to install, it runs on computers and phones, and all the content stays readable by search engines too.
3D models by Kenney (CC0), Jost typeface, built with three.js. Flags by flag-icons, IP Geolocation by DB-IP.
MagicMetrics
MagicMetrics is a digital services company that starts from data, because a website, a campaign or a strategy are only as good as the foundations they stand on. We handle analytics, advertising, SEO and visibility in the answers of AI-based engines, 3D websites, custom software and GDPR, under a single direction.
Our cornerstone is server-side tracking. Moving data collection from the browser to the server means more complete and reliable data, faster websites and campaigns that waste less budget, because they optimise on what really happens and not on what the browser manages to report. It also gives more control over what is collected and where it goes.
We develop software every day and we really know how to do it. GA4 Magic Reports, our add-on for Google Workspace, proves it: it has passed 88,000 installs. We use AI too, but there is a huge difference between having code generated and knowing how it must be built to sustain growth, stay secure and leave no loopholes. That is why we work with privacy by design: privacy is not an add-on at the end of the project, it is in the architecture from the very first line.
About me
Michele Pisani. I have seen many companies build skyscrapers on foundations of sand without noticing: the data comes in, but it cannot be trusted. I set up data collection, compliantly, and test it obsessively, so that decisions start from reliable data. Two books on programming and data written by my own hand, and today AI at work in my projects too.
Contacts
The Monument of the Four Moors
Piazza Micheli · 1595–1626
It is the symbol of Livorno. The Carrara marble statue of Ferdinando I de' Medici, the grand duke who made the city grow, was carved by Giovanni Bandini between 1595 and 1601 and raised onto its pedestal in 1617. Between 1623 and 1626 Pietro Tacca added the four chained bronze Moors at his feet.
The Old Fortress
Porto Mediceo · 1519–1534
Built for the Medici between 1519 and 1534 to a design by Antonio da Sangallo, it incorporates much older structures: the Mastio di Matilde, an 11th-century tower, and the Quadratura dei Pisani, the castle built by Pisa in 1377. For centuries it guarded the entrance to the port.
The Venezia Nuova quarter
Medici canals · 17th century
Built in the late 1620s north of the old town, it is crossed by canals, with warehouses and houses facing the water: it was the trading quarter, right behind the port. Venetian craftsmen came to lay the foundations in the water, using the techniques of their lagoon: hence the name. Every summer its streets fill up for the “Effetto Venezia” festival.
The Fish Market
Scali delle Ancore · Venezia quarter
The Fish Market building stands on the Scali delle Ancore, a stone's throw from the port and the Four Moors. In 2014 the artist Libertà (Libera Capezzone) painted a giant 27-metre sardine on its roof, with a line by the poet Viola Barbara: “Lische Squame Coda Amore Libertà” (bones, scales, tail, love, freedom). It is among the best-known murals in Tuscany.
The American Market
From 1944 to today
It was born in November 1944, when the American troops arrived in the city: all kinds of goods from the United States passed through its stalls. For more than sixty years it stood in Piazza XX Settembre; in 2009 it moved to the port area, near the Maritime Station.
The New Fortress
Fosso Reale · 1590–1600
Begun in 1590 and completed around 1600, it defended the Medici city as it grew. Several architects worked on the design, including Bernardo Buontalenti and Giovanni de' Medici. Its stone and brick walls rise from the water; since 1972, after its restoration by the city council, the upper part has been a public park.
Piazza della Repubblica
The “Voltone” · around 1840
It looks like a square, but it is a huge vault over the Fosso Reale canal, which flows beneath it through a tunnel more than 220 metres long: that is why the people of Livorno call it “il Voltone” (the big vault). It was built around 1840 to a design by Luigi Bettarini. At its two ends stand the statues of the grand dukes Ferdinando III, by Francesco Pozzi, and Leopoldo II, by Emilio Santarelli.
The Central Market
Mercato delle Vettovaglie · 1894
Opened in 1894 to a design by the Livorno engineer Angiolo Badaloni, inspired by Les Halles in Paris, it is one of the great examples of late 19th-century iron and glass architecture. It is the largest covered market in Italy and among the largest in Europe: ever since, it has been where the city does its shopping.
The Modigliani heads
Fosso Reale · 1984
In 1984, for the centenary of Amedeo Modigliani's birth, the city had the Fosso Reale dredged in search of sculptures the artist was said to have thrown into it. Three heads were fished out, and leading critics attributed them to Modigliani. They were all fakes: one had been made by three students with a Black & Decker drill, the other two by the artist Angelo Froglia.
Piazza Cavour
Fosso Reale · 19th century
Born in the 19th century along the Fosso Reale, it took its present shape between the 1830s and the 1870s. Since 1871 it has been home to the monument to Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour, by the Livorno sculptor Vincenzo Cerri, with four eagles by Giovanni Puntoni.
The Medici Port
The Leggi Livornine · 1591–1593
The port built by the Medici made Livorno's fortune. With the Leggi Livornine of 1591 and 1593, Ferdinando I invited merchants of every nation to the city (Levantines, Spaniards, Portuguese, Greeks, Germans, Jews, Turks, Armenians, Persians), offering freedom of worship, tax exemptions, housing and the cancellation of debts and convictions. Livorno became a city open to the world, a character that still sets it apart.
The Scoglio della Regina
Viale Italia · since 1846
The name (“the Queen's Rock”) comes from Maria Luisa of Bourbon, Queen of Etruria, who in the early 19th century came to bathe on these rocks, in a pool dug especially for her. In 1846 one of the city's first bathing establishments opened here. After decades of neglect the building has been restored and today houses a marine research centre, from marine robotics to marine biology.
The Diacinto Cestoni Aquarium
Terrazza Mascagni · since 1937
Opened on 20 June 1937 and named after the naturalist Diacinto Cestoni, who died in Livorno in 1718, it was destroyed by the bombings of 1943 and rebuilt in 1950. Closed for works in 1999, it reopened in 2010: today it has 33 tanks with over 2,000 animals of about 300 species, from the Mediterranean and tropical seas.
The Terrazza Mascagni
Seafront · 1925–1928
Livorno's drawing room by the sea. Built between 1925 and 1928 and originally named after Costanzo Ciano, after the war it was extended northwards and dedicated to Pietro Mascagni, the Livorno composer of “Cavalleria rusticana”. Its chequerboard floor has 34,800 black and white tiles, the balustrade on the sea 4,100 small columns; the bandstand dates from 1935.
The Meloria Tower
Meloria shoals · the battle of 1284
On these shoals, about 7 kilometres from the port, on 6 August 1284 the fleet of Genoa defeated that of Pisa: a crushing defeat for the Republic of Pisa. The tower, destroyed and rebuilt several times over the centuries, stands on four pillars joined by arches, to offer less resistance to the waves.
The Meloria Lighthouse
Marine protected area · since 2010
Next to the tower stands the metal lattice light: the first was built in 1867, destroyed in the war in 1944 and rebuilt fourteen years later. Since 2010 the shoals have been a marine protected area, with Posidonia seagrass meadows, rocky seabeds and wrecks from many centuries: a destination for divers.
The Amerigo Vespucci
Italian Navy training ship · 1931
Launched on 22 February 1931 at Castellammare di Stabia, she is the training ship of the Italian Navy: every summer she takes the cadets of the Naval Academy of Livorno to sea. The story goes that in 1962 an American aircraft carrier, crossing her path in the Mediterranean, signalled: “You are the most beautiful ship in the world”. Her motto: “Non chi comincia ma quel che persevera” (not the one who begins, but the one who perseveres).
The Whale Sanctuary
Pelagos Sanctuary
The sea off Livorno is part of the Pelagos Sanctuary, a protected area of about 87,500 km² set up in 1999 by Italy, France and the Principality of Monaco for marine mammals. Twelve species of cetaceans live here, including dolphins, sperm whales and fin whales, the second largest animal on the planet after the blue whale.