What to See in La Spezia, Italy: Free Audio Guide

La Spezia is a port city in eastern Liguria, known for its historic centre, maritime setting, churches, palaces and hilltop fortress. It is also a useful base for exploring Cinque Terre, but the city itself rewards a closer look. Neywo’s free audio guide to La Spezia includes 48 narrated places, so you can explore its streets while hearing the stories behind them.

What to See in La Spezia

Castello San Giorgio

One of the most important things to do in La Spezia is climb to Castello San Giorgio on Colle del Poggio. The fortress overlooks the city and its bay, and its gardens provide a peaceful place to pause above the urban centre.

The castle began as a defensive stronghold and was reinforced by the Genoese in the thirteenth century under Niccolò Fieschi. Although the site is associated with an earlier castle from the ninth century, much of the structure visible today dates from the seventeenth century. Its medieval plan is square, with four towers positioned diagonally at the corners. Sections of the old city wall survive around it, including archways and narrow openings once used by archers.

The entrances display the coat of arms of Genoa and a relief of Saint George defeating the dragon. Inside, the archaeological museum contains pottery, tools and sculptures from the Copper Age and Roman period, as well as Roman remains.

Amedeo Lia Civic Museum

The Amedeo Lia Civic Museum occupies a former convent complex in the heart of La Spezia. Its collection contains around one thousand works donated by the local collector Amedeo Lia to the municipality during his lifetime.

The works range from antiquity to the twentieth century and include paintings, sculptures, miniatures and decorative objects from Italian and European art. The museum opened in 1996 in the former convent of the Minimum Friars of San Francesco di Paola. Construction of the complex began in 1616, and the building later served as a military hospital, civil hospital, barracks, residence, court and municipal offices before its renovation in the 1990s.

Via del Prione and the historic palaces

Via del Prione is one of the central streets of La Spezia’s old town. Today it is a main shopping street, but its name recalls the Genoese word pria, meaning stone. The reference is to a pulpit where town criers announced important news during public assemblies.

Palazzo Doria stands along the street at the crossings with Via Sapri and Via Gioberti. The historic centre also includes Castagnola Palace, an ancient noble residence near Piazza Sant’Agostino. A few steps away, Palazzo Oldoini De’ Nobili stands at number 59. It belonged to the Spezzini Rolli, a tradition involving noble homes used to accommodate public figures visiting La Spezia.

The street is also associated with Richard Wagner, who is said to have found inspiration here for the prelude to The Rhine Gold while staying in the city.

Nostra Signora della Neve

On Viale Garibaldi, Nostra Signora della Neve stands out with its green-and-white striped façade. This neo-Romanesque church was built in the nineteenth century and completed in 1901. Its appearance recalls the grand cathedrals of Florence, although its construction is relatively recent.

Two small false bell towers frame the façade, while the main entrance sits beneath a decorative porch. Above it, a mosaic depicts Our Lady of the Snows; further mosaics show Saint Francis de Sales and Saint John Bosco.

Inside, the church has three aisles divided by masonry pillars. Red Verona marble columns, Corinthian capitals, a deep-blue coffered ceiling with golden stars and Byzantine-inspired frescoes give the interior a richly decorated appearance. The altar area includes an apse and ambulatory, with a triumphal arch above the main altar.

La Spezia Cathedral

La Spezia Cathedral is the Cathedral of Christ the King, or Cristo Re. It is the city’s most important Catholic place of worship and serves as the cathedral of the Diocese of La Spezia, Sarzana and Brugnato.

Nostra Signora della Salute

In Piazza Brin, Nostra Signora della Salute is also known as the Madonna della Scorza. This Catholic church stands in the historic centre, in the Umberto I district, and forms part of the city’s varied collection of religious landmarks.

Palazzo Maggiani and Grattacielo Bibbiani

La Spezia’s architecture is not limited to medieval buildings and churches. Palazzo Maggiani, at the meeting point of Corso Cavour and Viale Aldo Ferrari, is one of the city’s notable Liberty-style buildings. Liberty is the Italian form of Art Nouveau, and the palace is a characteristic example of the style in La Spezia.

On Via Vittorio Veneto, the Grattacielo Bibbiani provides a contrasting twentieth-century landmark. This residential building dates from 1927 and stands at number 19, its height making it a distinctive feature of the area.

The lost Politeama Duca di Genova

The present-day Piazza Verdi once contained the Politeama Duca di Genova, La Spezia’s nineteenth-century lyric theatre. Construction began in 1877 to a design by Erminio Pontremoli, and the theatre opened in 1880 with a performance of Aida.

Its auditorium had a main seating area, three tiers of boxes and two galleries, with room for about two thousand people. The theatre remained active for around fifty years before being demolished in 1933 as part of a plan to expand the city eastward. Although the building has disappeared, its history adds another layer to La Spezia’s cultural past.

Churches beyond the centre

Several churches extend the city’s story beyond the main historic streets. The Sanctuary of Madonna dell’Olmo sits on the slopes of Monte Santa Croce above Fabiano, overlooking the western side of the Gulf of La Spezia. In Cadimare, Nostra Signora del Pianto stands on Via della Marina. In Pitelli, San Bartolomeo Apostolo is a Catholic place of worship with its own parish. Sacro Cuore offers another opportunity to pause and take in the city’s surroundings.

La Spezia and its wider setting

La Spezia is the capital of the Province of La Spezia, the easternmost part of Liguria on Italy’s Ligurian coast. The province covers 882 square kilometres and lies between the Ligurian Sea and the inland borders of Emilia-Romagna and Tuscany. That position helps explain why the city brings together coastal connections, maritime activity and routes towards northern and central Italy.

For more of the region, you can continue towards Genoa, Levanto or Sestri Levante. La Spezia is also a natural point of comparison with other destinations in Italy.

Explore La Spezia with Neywo

Neywo offers three walking tours and one bike route in La Spezia, with 27 narrated stops in total across the routes. The walks are:

• Old La Spezia: A Fortress, Palaces and Wagner’s Street — 1.17 km, 60 minutes and 9 stops.
• Navy Museum to Futurist Square: Ships, Opera and a Rearing Garibaldi — 1.52 km, 57 minutes and 8 stops.
• Liberty Style and the Railway Quarter — 1.63 km, 50 minutes and 6 stops.

The bike route is Pegazzano Cycle Lane: From the Picco Stadium to Palazzo Maggiani — 1.4 km, 7 minutes and 4 stops.

Download Neywo and explore La Spezia at your own pace. The app tells the story of each place as you reach it, with no group and no schedule. Narration is available in 11 languages.