About Us

The pace of the village

Portofino isn't built like a town. It's built like one square with a harbour attached. The Piazzetta — officially Piazza Martiri dell'Olivetta — is thirty metres by forty of coloured façades, four restaurants, two bars and a quay. Everything else is alleyways climbing uphill, the footpath to the lighthouse and the road out to Paraggi. The permanent population is around four hundred. On an August day several thousand people come through on boats and coaches, and by eight in the evening they have gone, and the village returns to its actual size.

That single fact explains the rhythm. Daytime Portofino is public and crowded; evening Portofino is almost private. Our working window opens around half past six: aperitivo on the square, once the sun has dropped behind the headland and the day-trip boats have left. Dinner runs from half past eight to half past ten. After that it's either back to the yacht, or a bar until midnight, or a car to Santa Margherita. By one in the morning the lights on the Piazzetta go out.

The client here is a recognisable type. Owners and guests of the yachts lying in the bay or berthed at Marina di Portofino. Guests of Splendido and Splendido Mare. Italians from Milan and Turin who drive down for the weekend, two hours on the motorway. Americans, for whom Portofino is a fixed point on the Ligurian route between Florence and the Cinque Terre. Guests from the Middle East, more often in July and August, usually travelling as families with a separate programme for the evenings. The crowd is quieter than on the Costa Smeralda or in Ibiza: people come here for a particular view over the bay and a dinner that starts slowly, not for clubs.

Requests mostly land two to seven days out. That's a sensible horizon: nothing in Portofino can be settled at the last minute, because almost everything runs into logistics — the boat, the taxi on a one-way road, the table that is already booked. The manager replies within three minutes and matching takes thirty to a hundred and twenty minutes. But matching isn't the long part. What takes longer is agreeing the route: where the companion sets out from, where you meet, and how she gets back.

APEX has worked since 2012 and operates in 58 cities. Portofino is the smallest point on the network by population and one of the most demanding to prepare.

The season: May to September, and an honest word about winter

The season opens around Easter and closes in the first days of November. Splendido traditionally runs from late March or early April to early November, Splendido Mare in roughly the same window. Langosteria in Paraggi is a summer project, usually June through September. Half the restaurants on the Piazzetta and in the alleys take their winter holiday right behind the hotels.

May and June are the best time for the balance of weather and density. The water is already swimmable at Paraggi, the boats run a full timetable, but the crowds haven't arrived and a table at Puny can still be had a couple of days ahead. July and August are the peak: the bay is packed, the car park fills by morning, the best tables go a week out, and rooms at Splendido Mare disappear months in advance. September is a quieter version of July: warm sea, the tourists gone, and the Monaco Yacht Show and Genoa's Salone Nautico pulling the yachting crowd into the region.

About winter we'll be blunt, with no attempt to sell you the off-season. From November to March Portofino is all but shut. Splendido and Splendido Mare are closed, so is a large share of the restaurants, the boats run rarely or not at all, and on a weekday the Piazzetta can be empty in the literal sense. Coming here in winter for an evening is not a good idea, and we say so before we take the request.

What we offer instead. If your dates are winter dates and you're on the coast anyway, it makes more sense to move the meeting to Santa Margherita Ligure or Rapallo — life there runs all year, the Excelsior Palace is open through the winter, the restaurants work. Or to Genoa, forty minutes away. Or to Milan, two hours on the motorway, where we run a full programme. Portofino itself we honestly recommend keeping for May to September.

Where we work

The village itself. The Piazzetta and Calata Marconi — the quay, the bars, the fish restaurants. Via Roma, the only proper street, running up from the square, with Splendido Mare on it. Viale Baratta — the climb to Splendido. Salita San Giorgio — the stairway to the church of San Giorgio, with the view down over the bay. All of it fits inside a fifteen-minute walk, apart from the climb to Splendido: ten to fifteen minutes uphill, and nobody does it in heels.

Paraggi — a cove a kilometre and a half away, the only sandy beach in the area. In summer it holds the beach clubs, Langosteria and the lunch-by-the-water format. By day it's the main alternative to the Piazzetta.

Yachts. Marina di Portofino is a small marina with a limited number of berths; larger vessels more often lie at anchor in the bay and work by tender. A sizeable share of our July and August evenings happen on board, or begin on board and continue with dinner ashore.

Santa Margherita Ligure — five kilometres, about fifteen minutes by boat, ten to fifteen by car. Grand Hotel Miramare and Imperiale Palace are here, along with a proper seafront, car parks and the only coherent nightlife in the area. For many clients this is the base, and Portofino is the evening.

Rapallo — ten kilometres, Excelsior Palace Hotel on the headland, open all year. Camogli — about half an hour by road, and the departure point for boats to the abbey of San Fruttuoso, which can only be reached from the water or on foot along the trail.

Trips out. The Cinque Terre — about an hour. Genoa — forty minutes. Milan — two hours on the A12/A7. Sestri Levante, Zoagli, Portovenere — within an hour to an hour and a half. Everything beyond the Tigullio coast is agreed in advance, a day ahead at minimum, and priced by agreement rather than by the village rate.

Logistics: how you actually get to Portofino

This is the case where logistics are half the scenario, and they have to be discussed before the restaurant.

Access to the village is restricted. The road from Santa Margherita runs along the edge of the cliff, single-lane in places, and in summer it stands still. There is one car park in Portofino, underground, expensive, and in season it fills up in the morning. So most people don't arrive by car: they come by boat from Santa Margherita (about fifteen minutes), from Rapallo (about half an hour), from Camogli — or on their own yacht, straight into the bay. The boats run a seasonal timetable, and the evening sailings finish before dinner does, so the way back is nearly always a taxi or a tender.

Airports. Genoa, Cristoforo Colombo (GOA) — about forty minutes by car, the nearest option. Milan Malpensa (MXP) — around two and a half hours. Milan Linate — around two hours. Pisa — roughly two hours. Nice is almost three hours from here, however close it looks on the map.

Train. The station is Santa Margherita Ligure-Portofino, on the Genoa–La Spezia line: about thirty-five minutes from Genoa, around two and a half hours from Milan with a change. From the station to Portofino it's a taxi or a boat.

Helicopter. There is no landing pad in the village and there never will be. Helicopter transfers land in Genoa or elsewhere on the coast and continue by car or boat; that kind of route we agree separately, in advance.

The practical conclusion. A two-hour slot in Portofino is dinner and nothing else, because the travel eats the rest. If you want an aperitivo, dinner and an evening on the water, plan on four hours or more. We say this at the request stage, not afterwards.

Etiquette and dress code

Portofino isn't about shine, it's about the quality of the cloth. The Ligurian code is restrained: linen, silk, simple cuts, minimal jewellery. Anything that looks like a night out at a club reads as foreign here, and it reads that way instantly — the village is small and the audience has seen everything.

Splendido and La Terrazza are the most formal address in the area. For dinner, a jacket for men, a long or cocktail dress for women. A tie isn't required, but shorts and trainers don't go up to the terrace. Shoes — a stable heel or no heel at all: you have to climb to the hotel, and the paving on the way up is slippery in places.

DaV Mare and Chuflay at Splendido Mare — evening smart casual, right at the water. Puny is the local classic, and people go there without ceremony: neat, not dressed up. O Magazin, the fish restaurant on the quay, is simpler still — a light dress and sandals are perfectly at home there. La Gritta is aperitivo: a cocktail look for the day or the early evening.

A yacht is its own set of rules, and they have nothing to do with looks. No heels on teak — shoes come off at the passerelle or you change into flats. Long hems are awkward on a passerelle and in a tender. The sensible kit is flat soles for on board, a second pair for ashore and a light wrap: after sunset the bay is noticeably fresher than the square.

Paraggi by day is a beach club: swimsuit, pareo, hat, a change of dress for lunch. Nobody sits down at Langosteria in a wet swimsuit.

And the general rule for the village: everything on the Piazzetta is in plain view. A calm arrival, no loud scenes, no luggage and a meeting point agreed in advance — that's enough for the evening to pass without a single extra glance.

Things we say plainly

Minimum slot — two hours. We don't go below that anywhere in the network, and in Portofino it's particularly pointless: the drive from Santa Margherita and back alone eats an hour. The real format here starts at four hours, and in yacht scenarios it's more often the whole evening.

Pricing. From €1,500 for two hours, €2,000 for four. Media segment — from €3,500 for two hours and from €5,000 for four. A night, twenty-four hours, two days and trips beyond the Tigullio coast are on request: there are too many variables in them — boat, road, hotel, season — to name a figure in advance. Payment in euros, by bank transfer, in cash or in cryptocurrency.

On availability at peak. July and August are dense weeks, and we do take "for tonight" requests then, but we warn you honestly: the choice will be narrow and the logistics may not come together. For those dates the right horizon is two to four weeks.

On nightlife. Portofino doesn't have any. No clubs, no discos; the bars on the Piazzetta close around midnight or one. The nearest club format is Covo di Nord-Est in Santa Margherita. If the evening is built around a club, Portofino is the wrong town, and we'll say so at once rather than after payment.

On winter — see above: from November to March the village is all but closed, and we'll suggest Santa Margherita, Genoa or Milan.

Boundaries. Sharing a model's photos with third parties is forbidden. We don't haggle after the meeting. We don't take scenarios that put a companion's safety at risk. These rules are the same in all 58 cities of the network.