The Italian Mall Where Cool Girls Shop

Let us let you in on a little secret about the cool Euro fashion girls: when it comes to shopping, they are not above a good deal. And when they’re on the hunt, there’s only one destination that matters: The Mall Firenze, a designer outlet shopping mecca that is stuff of a fashion lover’s dreams.

Located about 45 minutes outside the city center of Florence, a trip to The Mall Firenze, founded nearly 25 years ago, is a quintessential day trip of shopping and lunching. If you’re partaking in a pre-game jaunt before Milan Fashion Week, it’s a swift two-hour train ride from the Milan Centrale train station and a good place to purchase last-minute show-week looks. There are no photos allowed inside (which means you know it’s legit and highly VIP), but picture this: your favorite luxury boutiques in Milan and Paris being plucked from their homes on Via Montenapoleone or Avenue Montaigne and dropped right into the sunny and plush hills of Firenze.

It gets better; inside you can find a pair of Celine kitten heels or Chloé jeans for less than 500 euros. The Gucci boutique is vast and filled with its normal array of candy-colored goods (more kitten heels for less than 500 euros!). The true holy grail is the Saint Laurent boutique, where men’s and women’s ready-to-wear and accessories can be found for truly shocking prices (in a good way). But make no mistake — these designer luxury outlets have nary a discount bin in sight. Like any luxury boutique, you receive the white glove experience and can sip on champagne while shopping.

And as you float through the lofty clouds of shopping heaven, it’s the little things that count. The welcome lounges at The Mall Firenze are a lifesaver and act like a personal assistant. Whether it’s arranging transportation, handing out umbrellas during an unexpected thunderstorm, providing a portable charger for your phone, setting you up for the loyalty program, or organizing the paperwork in the tax-free lounge (long wait times at the airports be damned), the services provided are what make The Mall Firenze such an enticing and unique experience for shoppers.

In addition to the stores, The Mall Firenze offers luxury Experiences that range from cooking classes to Tuscan picnics to five-star spas, and in my case, a private custom fragrance creation session at Aquaflor. Once a home to a noble family, the cavernous boutique, with its ancient staircases and winding rooms filled with shelves of locally made soaps and curated scents from around the world, almost feels like you’ve been transported in time. The private personalized fragrance session is like attending a chic chemistry class. An in-house perfumer profiles your fragrance preference (and just like chemistry class, learning the terminology does take a minute), and the process is as self-revelatory as it is exciting. During the process, the expert curates specific scents based on your profile, and after ranking each one on a scale of 1 to 10, your top three make the final product (mine were fig, green tea, and musk). Then after a quick series of beaker pouring and delicate stirring, you’re sent home with your bespoke fragrance. Beauty science is the best science.

And if you’re not planning a trip to Italy soon? The outlets have expanded to a newer outpost in Sanremo, which is a hop, skip, and a jump away from the French Riviera. After shopping, you can take a boat ride to have lunch in Monaco. Chances are, you’ll have a great new outfit for the occasion.