May 2027

What it is

The 5 Rhythms are a movement practice born in the Seventies from Gabrielle Roth. There are no figures or choreographies to learn: you follow the music through five rhythms — flowing, staccato, chaos, lyrical and stillness — which one after the other form a wave. You dance on your own and among others, and everyone moves however it comes.

No class

Nothing is taught: you practice, or you watch how it's done. Someone who just started dances with someone who's been at it for twenty years.

Even if you don't dance

The Banco A Ristoro is open, the kitchen is cooking, and sitting down doesn't commit you to anything.

No rush

A moment made for taking your time and sharing it, in a space that's elegant, unusual and welcoming.

Book a table

From 12:00 to 3:30 pm. If you're coming as a group you can book, and you should: the second Sunday the lounge fills up.

From the outside you see little

The legs stay close and almost everything happens in the weight and the connection to the floor: that's how the pioneers told it apart from “dancing for spectators.” It's a dance that gives more than it promises when you watch it, and you only get it by trying it.

Four afternoons a season

One in November, one in January, one in March and one in May, always on a Sunday. From 2 to 4 pm the first level, for anyone who has never done Balboa; from 4:30 to 5:30 pm an open class on one topic, for those who have. The afternoon social dance starts at 5 pm.

Then you stay

Drinks and snacks are included, and so are the icebreaker games. The swing night follows.

Who comes

Students, expats, people here on Erasmus, travelers — and anyone who wants to meet new people in Florence.

From three to seven

The afternoon runs from 3 to 7 pm, and inside it you move around: you come for one thing and stay for another.

What goes on

The constant is the Circolo di Lettura. The others change and take turns — pastry, sewing and embroidery, painting, sign language — and any Saturday can bring a new one.

It ends at the table

Every session ends with a friendly aperitivo, the moment when people who didn't know each other start talking.

The first book

“Never Let Me Go” by Kazuo Ishiguro. Kathy, Ruth and Tommy grow up in a boarding school in the English countryside, where everything seems safe and in order.

A truth that arrives slowly

Ishiguro doesn't need plot twists: the novel's strength is the calm with which it leads you toward something that becomes hard to ignore.

After the meeting

Anyone who wants to stops by the Banco A Ristoro for a drink and keeps the conversation going. The pages matter, says Giulia, but the conversations matter even more.