Prato is a special place for me, and in ways I never expected when I first visited as a young Art History student back in the 1980s. I was on a research trip to Florence and came to Prato briefly to see the church of Santa Maria delle Carceri because I was fascinated by Renaissance architecture. In the mid-1990s, back in Florence again and trying to learn Italian through conversation exchanges with local students, I met my wife. She is from Prato, and when we married in 1998, as destiny would have it, the ceremony was held inside the church of Santa Maria delle Carceri.