Shopping streets: haute couture and flea markets

If you have decided to treat yourself to an itinerary along the shopping streets of Rome, including famous boutiques, exclusive ateliers, second-hand markets and artisan workshops, you are spoilt for choice, you have just to go out and a few steps away from our guest house My Suite Piazza di Spagna, you will be in the Trident area.

The Trident area and Via del Corso

Enter intensely the collective imagination: via dei Condotti, via Frattina, via Borgognona and via del Babuino stretch all around Piazza di Spagna and are part of what is defined as the Trident area; a concentration of high fashion shops where you will find luxury brands such as Gucci, Ermanno Scervino, Tiffany, Giorgio Armani, Chanel, Bulgari, Hermes, Versace and Jimmy Choo, just to mention a few. It will be a pleasure to join the crowds for a spot of window shopping and admire the always chic displays that line Rome’s most exclusive streets. Stop for coffee at the city’s oldest coffeehouse: Antico Caffè Greco, an institution (via dei Condotti 86).

If you decide to go along via dei Condotti, you will find another area to explore if you are in the spending mood…. maybe more thrifly; it is the famous via del Corso. This massive boulevard, which runs from Piazza Venezia to Piazza del Popolo is filled with stores from top to bottom, where shopping is also cheaper. At about half way you can stop at Alberto Sordi Gallery, formerly Galleria Colonna, with bookstores, restaurants, shops and famous chains like H&M and Zara.
A little more than 700 meters from our guest house My Suite Piazza di Spagna, you will also walk into via del Campo Marzio, known mainly for antiques and novelty, with elegant and expensive shops; stop in the characteristic Piazzetta Sant’Eustachio, then go back to via del Babuino or else via Margutta and Ripetta, true temples of clothing and jewellery.

Street markets, handicraft and low-cost shopping

If you are a vintage lover, you have to move farther south, beyond the Quirinale gardens; via del Boschetto, in the beautiful rione Monti, is popular for its handicraft boutiques, here you can find unique retro accessories, even if not so cheap; on the weekend, you can even pop into Mercatino Monti.
Near Piazza Navona, via del Governo Vecchio is another destination you can’t miss. Here you can buy second-hand clothing years 60s and 70s as well as vintage items. Among the many shops, we point out Altroquando ( at No. 82), a small library specialized in cinema.
Towards St. Peter you can walk into via del Pellegrino, known in the past as via degli Orafi (goldsmith), and now dotted with artisan workshops and shops of handmade objects, furniture and frames.
At the back of Castel Sant’Angelo there is another important commercial arterial road of the capital city, via Cola di Rienzo, in Prati district, which together with viale Giulio Cesare, via Candia and via Ottaviano offers shops for all budgets and for all needs. Castroni is worth a stop (via Cola di Rienzo 196/198), here in addition to the famous coffee you will find typical food and a wide choice of wines & spirits.

Finally, if you have more time at your disposal you can take the Metro (linea A) and reach via Tuscolana with hundreds of trendy shops, international chains and the Big shopping center Cinecittà 2, that will guarantee you low cost purchases; or opt for San Giovanni district, with via Appia Nuova full of shops of all kinds and price and the typical local market of via Sannio (weekdays, in the morning), also visited by Sarah Jessica Parker, when passing through Rome!

Italian text by Deborah Terrin