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Admire the Baroque Beauty. Swoon in Gilded Palaces. S icily, the largest — and most fascinating — island in the Mediterranean, quickly takes hold of your imagination. Its baroque palaces and rococo towns possess a voluptuous beauty that borders on delirium — a sybaritic style born of millennia of Greek, Phoenician, Carthaginian, Arab, Norman, Spanish, and Italian influences colliding on heat-struck marble walls and sun-drenched carved stone. Churches, chapels, and private villas throughout the island are in sensory abundance with baroque epiphanies of stucco twirling across vaulted ceilings and marble floors in geometric arabesques that dizzy the eye. Christopher Garis, author of the lavish new book Inside Sicily (Vendome), has had a love affair with the island since he arrived there as an art-obsessed teenager. Originally from San Diego, he was studying at a school near Rome when he headed south with his classmates and their professor to turn an intense focus on the glories of Sicilian art and architecture. Sketchbooks, brushes, and paints in hand, Garis became an expert on the island's Greek temples, Roman mosaics, ancient towns crowned by cathedrals with ornate domes, and 18th-century golden-era Palermo palazzi of transcendent artistry and craftsmanship. "In the oldest neighborhood of Palermo, the opulent Palazzo Valguarnera-Gangi stands, and other superbly maintained palazzi are compelling," Garis says. "But another favorite way to see that time period is to visit the privately funded Oratorio di Santa Cita in Palermo that features works of Giacomo Serpotta. This artist was a true genius with plaster. His interiors are soothingly white and overwhelmingly ornate, with angels and putti and saints sculpted acrobatically on ceilings and walls." A visit to the Palazzo dei Normanni, the oldest royal palace in Europe, is also a must, he says. Its interior explains the connections among the Arabs, Normans, and Greeks whose decorative traditions came together in this 10th-century building. "Sicily is a dream. It has incredibly dramatic landscapes and historic towns of great beauty. I suggest embracing relaxed itineraries and pausing to discover a sunny cafe, a distant beach, Greek temples, rococo churches, a midnight cocktail spot — always enjoying staccato moments of brilliance." — Christopher Garis, author of Inside Sicily Where to Travel Next By Diane Dorrans Saeks. Photography Guido Taroni. Seductive Sicily Palazzo Biscari ALL IMAGES FROM THE BOOK INSIDE SICILY BY CHRISTOPHER GARIS (© 2025, VENDOME) 58