Borghese Gallery

If you see only one art museum in Rome beyond the Vatican, make it the Borghese. Cardinal Scipione Borghese, nephew of Pope Paul V, built this villa in the early seventeenth century to show off a collection he assembled with ruthless enthusiasm, and he was the early patron of a young sculptor named Gian Lorenzo Bernini. The result is a set of rooms where the sculpture seems to move. In Apollo and Daphne, the nymph's fingers sprout leaves and her toes root into the ground as the god catches her; in the Rape of Proserpina, Pluto's hand presses into a marble thigh that looks like flesh; in Bernini's David, the hero bites his lip mid-throw. Antonio Canova's Paolina Borghese, Napoleon's sister reclining half-nude as Venus, is one of the most famous sculptures of the neoclassical age. Upstairs and down, the paintings are just as strong: a room of Caravaggios that includes the Boy with a Basket of Fruit, the Sick Bacchus and David with the Head of Goliath, Raphael's Deposition, and Titian's Sacred and Profane Love, all set among frescoed ceilings, marble walls and Roman mosaics. The gallery deliberately limits numbers: entry is by reservation only, in two-hour slots with a fixed exit time, and roughly a hundred and eighty people per slot. That makes the experience unusually civilised, but it means you must book, sometimes weeks ahead for weekends, and arrive early to collect tickets and check bags. The gallery is closed on Mondays, Christmas Day and New Year's Day.

The two-hour window is the defining feature, and it rewards a plan. Arrive half an hour before your slot to pick up tickets and leave anything bigger than a small handbag at the cloakroom, since medium and large bags and backpacks are not allowed inside. Late arrivals do not get extra time: the exit time stays fixed. Most visitors start on the ground floor with the sculptures, which is where the crowds bunch, so consider going upstairs first to the picture gallery while it is quiet, then coming down to the Berninis in the second hour. Either way, give Apollo and Daphne and Proserpina time — walk all the way round them, because Bernini designed them to unfold as you move.

Guided tours and audio guides help a great deal here, since the rooms are dense with mythological stories and the labels are minimal. A good guide also points out the ceiling cycles and the classical sculptures that inspired the Baroque ones. The building is compact, so two hours is enough for a thorough visit without fatigue. Photography rules can vary; follow staff instructions. Families with children who like stories of gods and monsters do well here, and the time limit keeps attention spans in check.

The gallery sits inside the Villa Borghese park, Rome's great green lung, so build time around it. Before or after, walk to the Pincio terrace for one of the classic views over Piazza del Popolo and the domes of the city, rent a rowing boat on the little lake by the Temple of Aesculapius, or hire a bike or pedal cart along the shady avenues. The Spanish Steps and the Hotel de Russie's garden are a downhill stroll away, and Villa Giulia, the Etruscan museum, is at the park's northern edge for anyone who wants more. On a hot day the park's shade is reason enough to come. If you can only manage one slot, choose the earliest of the day: the light in the sculpture rooms is lovely, the group tours have not yet built up, and you leave with the whole afternoon free for the park.