The 36 Best Things to Do in Italy

A glass bubble shaped like a grape floats above the Monsordo Bernardino vineyards outside Alba, which is the kind of architectural flex that either works or doesn't, and here it works. The Ceretto family has been at this forever, and the current generation runs tastings, vineyard walks, and Nebbiolo tutorials through the Langhe hills. They also make nougat, which feels right. Ranked 19th on the World's 50 Best Vineyards list.

White pebbles instead of sand keep the water at Cala dei Gabbiani impossibly clear all day, even when boats are passing. Tucked into the limestone cliffs of Sardinia's Costa di Baunei, this cove is quieter than its neighbors because getting here takes some effort, and the seabed drops off quickly enough that you're swimming among curious fish almost immediately. It ranked 18th on the World's 50 Best Beaches list, and it earns the placement without performing for anyone.

The shallow turquoise water here is so calm it reads as a lagoon, framed by a 16th-century watchtower and a tiny island just offshore. This northwest Sardinian beach outside Stintino draws serious summer crowds, so the local authorities now cap daily visitors to keep it from loving itself to death. Ranked among Europe's 50 Best Beaches, it earns the comparison to tropical destinations people keep making, Mediterranean geography notwithstanding.

Lavender and thyme scent the air the moment you walk in, which sets the tone for everything that follows. This spa on Lake Garda leans hard into simplicity, with saunas, steam rooms, multiple pools, and a fitness center, but the design keeps pulling the outside in through open sightlines and garden air. Vogue named it among the 100 Best Spas in the World. Lake Como gets the glamour; Garda, apparently, gets the quiet.

A spa so large that its four treatment wings each carry their own name, Lefay SPA Dolomiti sprawls across more than 5,000 square meters inside the Dolomites. The magnesium salt whirlpool anchors the whole operation, and guests circle back to it between circuits of herb-scented saunas, steam rooms of escalating intensity, and sensory waterfalls. Vogue named it among its 100 Best Spas in the World, which tracks: two days here barely scratches it.

The mineral water flowing through Fiuggi has been credited with dissolving kidney stones since Michelangelo made that claim, which is the kind of endorsement that outlasts any press trip. Palazzo Fiuggi is a full medical spa built around that same spring water, pairing clinical wellness programming with the sort of Italian hospitality that makes rigorous health protocols feel less like a regimen and more like a long, indulgent stay in the hills.

Sulfurous white water has been bubbling up from these Tuscan springs for longer than anyone has bothered to count, and the spa at Terme di Saturnia is built around that fact rather than despite it. It has the unhurried quality of a place that knows the water is the point, not the program. Vogue named it among the 100 Best Spas in the World, which tracks: the instinct here is to slow you down, not optimize you.

The spa at Borgo Egnazia swaps the resort's pale tufo limestone for something darker and more grotto-like, a deliberate shift into a different sensibility. Vair is a full luxury spa, with pools, treatment rooms, and a menu of therapies rooted in Puglian traditions and local ingredients. Vogue placed it among their 100 best spas in the world, which tracks when you step inside and realize the designers were clearly in a competition with themselves.

The Beauty Center at Villa d'Este sits inside a palazzo on Lake Como so old and so extravagant that a spa almost feels like an afterthought, which is precisely why it works. This is a full hotel spa with treatments calibrated for guests who arrived by boat and plan to stay awhile. The lake views do a lot of the therapeutic heavy lifting, and Vogue counts it among the world's 100 best spas, for whatever that's worth on a Tuesday in a robe.

Five oak casks that belonged to the Marchesa Giulia Falletti Colbert, the woman credited with inventing Barolo as a style, still sit in the cellars here and are still aging wine. A heritage estate tour in the heart of Barolo town, this is the kind of place where the history actually pours into your glass. Named a Discovery by The World's 50 Best Vineyards, which puts it in decent company for a region that hardly needs the help.

The Antinori estate slides into the Chianti hillside so quietly you could almost miss it, which is the point. This is a winery visit with architecture, a museum, and a restaurant attached, all belonging to a family that has been growing grapes here for 26 generations. The gravitational winemaking facility and rotating exhibitions give you something to look at between glasses, and the kitchen turns local produce into food polished enough to hold its own against the wine.

The barrels here have been stacked in the same vaulted cellars since before Sicily was part of Italy, and the architecture makes a decent argument on its own. Donnafugata's Marsala winery runs guided visits through its cellars and production spaces, pairing the tour with tastings of the estate's wines alongside Sicilian bites. It's the kind of afternoon that starts as education and quietly becomes a long, pleasant sit.

Irpinia has been growing grapes since Pliny wrote it down, and the hills around Sorbo Serpico still carry that feeling of a landscape that knows what it's doing. Feudi di San Gregorio is a wine estate worth making a day of, set among vineyards, olive groves, and hazel trees with the Apennines keeping watch. Medieval villages, old castles, and volcanic mud fields fill out the surroundings, and the airport is only half an hour away.

The cellars here tunnel beneath a royal hunting estate, which tells you something about the scale of Fontanafredda's ambitions. This sprawling Langhe winery is best known for its Barolo, and visitors can walk the biodynamic vineyards, poke around the historic cellars, and work through tastings that lean heavily on Nebbiolo. It's the kind of place that takes most of an afternoon, which Piedmont generally rewards.

Masi built its name on appassimento, the practice of drying harvested grapes to concentrate their sugars before fermentation, and Amarone della Valpolicella is the result. This is a winery visit in classic Veneto countryside, where the family operation runs single-vineyard estates and welcomes guests to explore them. The Foresteria Serego Alighieri, owned by descendants of Dante himself, offers apartments among the vines for anyone who'd like to stay.

A Palladian palace with an 18th-century barrel cellar underneath it is a good argument for rearranging your itinerary. Villa Sandi offers winery visits and tastings, including one by candlelight if you want to feel appropriately dramatic about Prosecco. Tours move through the cellar galleries where the estate's still and sparkling wines are aging, and masterclasses cover everything from winemaking to dining etiquette, which is a wide brief.