Long before you remember the crimes or the investigations, you remember Genoa. The sea. The narrow medieval streets. The old harbour. The faded pastel buildings standing against deep blue water. Every episode feels as though the city itself is quietly guiding Blanca through her investigations.
As someone who loves discovering Europe through television, I found myself wanting to visit Genoa almost as much as I wanted to know who committed the crime.
Some crime dramas are built around the murder. Other are built around the detective. Blanca does both, but it also does something more beautiful: it lets Genoa become part of the story.
This is not Italy as a postcard. Genoa in Blanca feels lived in, salty, colourful, steep, noisy, awkward and full of corners. The sea is there, but it doesn’t turn the city into a holiday brochure. The old streets, the harbour, the stairways, the food, the light and the colours all help build the world Blanca moves through with a little help from Linneo.
And Blanca does move. She does not just walk through Genoa. She listens to it, feels it, jokes with it, argues with it, dances with it. In her flat in the rain, in the streets. Blanca has a rhythm of her own.
That is what makes Blanca one of Italy’s most beautiful crime dramas. Not because it is soft or pretty, but because it gives the main character a full place in the world-at work, at home, in the city, in danger, in colour, in love.
Where was Blanca filmed?
Almost the entire world of Blanca is built around Genoa, the capital of Ital’ys Liguria region. The series uses the city beautifully: the historic centre, the harbour, the steep streets, the old buildings, the sea, and those narrow medieval alleyways known as caruggi.
The streets are part of what gives Blanca its atmosphere. They can feel dark, colourful, crowded, uncomfortable and alive all at once. Genoa is not shown as a polished holiday postcard. It feels like a real city, with real corners, real shadows and real noise.
Blanca’s home is connected with Camogli, the picturesque coastal town east of Genoa, with its pastel facades, sea views and small harbour. It gives the series a softer side- the place where Blanca can breathe, cook, dance, think and return to herself after the investigations.
Other Ligurian locations also help create the show’s Mediterranean character, including coastal towns and areas around Genoa such as Nervi, Rapallo and Camogli. The result is a crime drama that feels inseparable from the Ligurian coast, sea air, colour, old stone, steep streets and sudden darkness.
Genoa as Blanca’s Compass
What made Blanca so memorable to me is not only the investigations, but the way the series lets the place shape the character. Genoa is not just a backdrop. Through Blanca, the city becomes something you do not simply look at. You listen to it (Blanca snaps her fingers). You move through it (Blanca goes wherever Linneo goes. You feel the edges (Blanca bumps anywhere and everywhere, inside and outside)
That is why the series stayed with me. Long after the case is solved and the episode is finished, what remained with me was the thought of the next episode and how I should allow Blanca to show me her world.
Blanca moves through Genoa with confidence, humour and instinct-not as someone hidden from the world, but as someone fully inside it.
WATCH THE TRAILER BELOW
