A Turin city break is the sort of trip that quietly outperforms expectations. Italy’s first capital sits at the foot of the Alps with baroque squares, arcaded streets that run for kilometres and a museum collection that would anchor a much larger city, and yet most Australians pass straight through on the way to Milan, Cinque Terre or the lakes. Turin rewards the traveller who slows down and gives it a proper day or two.
Sam Newman spent an afternoon in the city for Cartier World Travel, filming in Piazza Castello and walking up Via Garibaldi, and the trip made one useful point for anyone planning their own visit: this is a city with plenty of doors, and it pays to know when they open.
Why a Turin city break is worth the detour
Turin was the seat of the House of Savoy, and it looks it. The centre was laid out with a ruler and a sense of ceremony, and the result is long straight streets, uniform facades and squares that open up in front of you rather than sneaking around a corner. Piazza Castello is the hinge of the whole thing, with the Royal Palace on one side and porticoes running off in several directions. Sam described it as the great square, and stood in it working out where everything else in the city was.
The porticoes are the practical genius of the place. You can walk a good part of the historic centre under cover, which matters in a city that gets genuinely hot in summer and cold and damp in winter.
The Shroud of Turin, and what you can actually see
The Shroud is the thing most visitors have heard of, and it is also the most commonly misunderstood. The cloth is kept in the cathedral and is only very rarely put on public display, so arriving on a given afternoon expecting to see it is not how it works. What the city does offer is a museum dedicated to the Shroud and its history, along with faithful replicas and the scientific and photographic material that has grown up around it.
Sam went looking for a replica in Piazza Castello and found the doors shut, with a four o’clock reopening and a priest away at lunch. That is a useful lesson rather than a wasted trip. Turin still keeps a serious afternoon break, and churches, museums and smaller sites can close for hours in the middle of the day. Check the timings before you set out, and build the closed hours into lunch rather than into your sightseeing.
Piazza Castello and the Royal Palace
The Royal Palace complex is the obvious anchor for a first morning. It takes in state apartments, the royal armoury and gardens, and it explains why the rest of the city looks the way it does. Turin has been a republican city for a long time now, but the Savoy layer is still the frame everything else hangs on.
Via Garibaldi, cars and the great museums
From Piazza Castello, Via Garibaldi runs west as a long pedestrian spine lined with shops and cafes, and it is the easiest orientation walk in the city. Off it and around it sit the collections that make Turin a museum destination in its own right: an Egyptian museum of international standing, the National Cinema Museum inside the Mole Antonelliana, and a national automobile museum that suits anyone who has ever had a soft spot for Italian machinery. Turin is Italy’s motor city, the home of Fiat, and the car story here is a proper one rather than a novelty.
Between museums, the cafe culture is the other half of the experience. Turin is a city of historic cafes, chocolate and vermouth, and an afternoon coffee sitting under the arcades is as much a part of the visit as anything with an entry queue.
When to go and how Turin fits a wider trip
Spring and autumn are the sweet spot, with comfortable walking weather and lighter crowds than the Italian summer. Summer is hot and many locals leave town. Winter is cold and clear, and it puts you close to the Alps if skiing is part of the plan.
Turin sits about an hour from Milan on the fast train, which is why so many people treat it as a day trip and head back in the evening, as Sam did. It works better with a night or two, slotted between Milan and the Ligurian coast, or as the Italian bookend to a trip that continues into France. If you would like a northern Italy itinerary that gives Turin the time it deserves and gets the opening hours right before you arrive, that is exactly the kind of planning we do at Cartier World Travel.
