Portofino: The Most Beautiful Village on the Ligurian Coast

Portofino has been the object of intelligent desire for seventy years. The painted harbour, the pine-covered promontory, the piazzetta at six in the evening: none of it disappoints. The question is only how to experience it without the crowds. We have the answer.

The view of Portofino from the sea — the painted houses rising above a small harbour whose water is verdigris and whose moored boats range from the working fisher's craft to a significant number of superyachts — is one of the most composed and most immediately satisfying in the Mediterranean. It appears, from the right angle, to have been designed as a backdrop for a particular kind of human activity: the activity of being somewhere beautiful in the company of people you have chosen, with no particular obligation except to pay attention and to enjoy it. This is not a trivial ambition. Portofino is one of the places where it can most completely be fulfilled.

The village itself is small: a piazzetta, two streets, a harbour, a promontory with a castle and a church, and the hillside behind with its paths through the regional nature park. The charm is not in the scale but in the density of the pleasure — the specific quality of the light in the late afternoon, the smell of the pine macchia on the hillside, the aperitivo ritual on the piazzetta as a piece of social theatre that has been performed at this particular stage for seventy years. We arrange the best tables, at the best hour, with the view correctly oriented. The rest takes care of itself.

By Private Boat: The Only Way to See the Promontory

The Portofino promontory is best understood from the sea. The pine-covered limestone cliffs, falling sheer into water of extraordinary clarity; the small coves accessible only by boat; the sea caves whose interiors shift in colour with the movement of the water; and, twenty minutes east by private launch, San Fruttuoso — the twelfth-century Benedictine abbey occupying a tiny cove with no road access, its Romanesque apse reflected in a sea of transparency, its simple trattoria serving the local catch at tables above the water. We arrange private dayboats and sailing yachts from the Portofino or Santa Margherita marina, with captains who know every passage along this coast, for days that move between swimming, fishing villages, the abbey lunch and the late-afternoon return with the light coming in from the west.

Camogli, half an hour north by sea, adds to the programme its extraordinary trompe-l'oeil building facades, its focaccia of particular quality and its sense of a Ligurian fishing town that has not been significantly altered by tourism.

The Hinterland: Trails, Olive Oil and the Villages Behind

The Portofino Nature Park — which surrounds the village with a protected zone of macchia, ancient olive groves and coastal cliff trails — provides the terrestrial counterpart to the boat programme. The trail from Portofino to San Fruttuoso on foot takes two and a half hours through terrain of great natural beauty, arriving at the abbey from above rather than from the sea, with a descent through abandoned terraces and the sound of the water building as you approach the cove.

Santa Margherita Ligure, fifteen minutes by road or sea, offers a more spacious and less self-conscious version of Ligurian coastal life: a proper market, good fish restaurants on the waterfront and the specific pleasure of a Riviera town that has not entirely forgotten that it was once a working port.

The Belmond Splendido and the Private Villas

The Belmond Hotel Splendido — positioned on the hillside above Portofino's harbour since 1901, its terrace views and its pool giving onto the bay in every direction — has been the benchmark of Italian coastal luxury for the duration of the form's existence. The guest list from the past century constitutes a reasonable sample of everyone who has mattered in the worlds of film, literature, politics and inherited wealth since the Second World War. Its annex, the Splendido Mare, sits directly on the piazzetta and provides a more immediate relationship with the village's daily life. For guests whose preference is privacy over service, we access a small number of private villas in the hills above Portofino — with pools, terraces over the bay, private chefs and boats at the marina — that provide the experience of the promontory in its most secluded form.

At six in the evening on the Portofino piazzetta, with the right aperitivo and the right table, you understand why this village has occupied the imagination of the world's most aesthetically demanding travellers for the past seventy years.

The Essentials

Best season: May–June and September for crowds manageable; July–August for full social programme

Signature experience: Full-day private boat: Portofino, San Fruttuoso abbey lunch, Camogli by sea

Stay: Belmond Hotel Splendido or Splendido Mare; private villa rentals on the promontory

Combine with: Cinque Terre (one hour south by boat), Camogli, Santa Margherita Ligure

Every journey we design is entirely bespoke — crafted around your preferences,your pace, and your desire for the exceptional.

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