What a fantastic leather store! We spent five days in Florence, looking around, visiting and…read morecomparing leather shops trying to find a medium-sized duffle bag for me and a small purse for my wife. So many shops with pushy and aggressive salesmen trying to pawn what seemed to be lower-quality leather products, but we avoided most of those. Some of the shops we visited based off previous reviews, and others we just walked into because they seemed worth checking out (and didn't have anyone aggressively trying to usher us in). We went into I Medici mainly because there was nobody outside the shop trying to drag us in--and the shop was located well away from The Leather School (be very wary of most of the shops in the square near The Leather School!) and boy were we in for a pleasant surprise! The salesman we saw the first day (we returned to actually purchase three days later) was very laid back, friendly, and basically just answered our questions and made a few recommendations based on what we described. He provide a pretty detailed explanation of the materials and process they used. I am not a leather expert, by any means, but the quality of leather here seemed on par with even that of The Leather School--but at half the price! The only difference we could see (and feel) was the bags at The Leather School were actually lined in leather, while the I Medici bags are lined in canvas with their emblem stamped all over it. I personally prefer the canvas lining. When we returned on day four, this time there was a friendly woman to meet us, and she immediately went and found a bag and purse that matched the sizes and descriptions of what we wanted. She was very patient and friendly, and explained the VAT tax refund process at the airport (only residents are required to actually pay this tax). We used the duffle bag to pack souvenirs we had already accumulated, and continued to add to that for the last ten days of our trip, and so far it seems very sturdy, but will follow up down the road with a review on durability. I highly recommend this business.