Prior to this past June, had you asked me for a roster of yet-unseen Italian spots I’d like to take my wife on vacation, Pompeii, Pisa, the Amalfi Coast, and Sicily would have surely made the list. Trieste on the other hand, was not on my radar. Before being invited by Prestige to take the helm of a couple of beautiful new releases and dive deep into their Italian factory, I knew next to nothing about northeast Italy’s grand old port city, nor the nearby coastal shipbuilding town of Monfalcone. But Trieste, set amidst and atop forested limestone outcroppings on a gin-clear sea, is really something. I want to go back—soon. And the next time it won’t be a solo mission.
Trieste has existed in some form or another for 2,000-plus years. It’s the centerpiece of the Gulf of Trieste, a gale-protected stretch of the subtropical Adriatic. A few miles from Slovenia, 15 miles from northern Croatia, and 50 miles from southern Austria, it’s a true cultural crossroads. The ancient Romans built a wondrous walled city here and an amphitheater for more than 3,000 spectators. The Austro-Hungarian Hapsburgs—complete with a bedroom designed to resemble a captain’s quarters. Walking the delightful waterfront, you hear a mishmash of tongues: Slavic, Germanic, and of course, every branch of Latin. Street signs are written in both Italian and what I came to learn was Slovenian. Stopping in at Pizzaria Calo for one of the best margherita pies I’ve ever torched the roof of my mouth on, I asked the manager where everyone strolling the waterfront or sipping tart Aperol spritzes came from. “Everywhere,” he said. “Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia, Albania, France, Italy, Germany, Greece, Switzerland.” He then mentioned the offshore sil-houette of sailing yacht the 460-foot, half-billion-dollar vessel seized from Russian tycoon Andrey Melnichenko. “Russia too,” he said with a laugh. “We don’t see so many Americans though. You can help us with that?”
