The Corridor was built in just five months in 1564 by order of Cosimo I de’ Medici and designed by Giorgio Vasari. It was commissioned along with the marriage of Cosimo’s son, Francesco, with Johanna of Austria. Cosimo wanted this corridor in order to move freely between his residence and government palace, avoiding normal streets. At the time it was infact a common  between rich families to feel insecure in public. The meat market of Ponte Vecchio was moved for the occasion because of its smell and in it was replaced by the goldsimth shops that you can still see on the bridge. Furthermore, the Corridor was forced to pass around the Mannelli’s Tower, after the opposition of that family to its destruction.

From the middle of Ponte Vecchio, the Corridor offers a suggestive view of the Arno and Ponte Santa Trinita; the windows that you can see nowadays were built for will of Benito Mussolini. It is also known that Hitler liked the visit to the Vasari Corridor; this fact saved Ponte Vecchio from distruction during the II World War.

In the Santa Felicita church the Corridor has a balcony where the Medici used to follow the mass without mixing with the populace.

In the Vasari Corridor a large and prestigious collection of portraits is showed.

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It was located in the Duomo square, between Piazza delle Pallottole and via dello Studio. Dante used to sat on that stone, whatching the construption of the Cathedral.

For more information about this curiosity, check the following link (in Italian) – http://firenzecuriosita.blogspot.com/

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Probably the most known of his painting is the Madonna of the Harpies (Madonna delle Arpie), where the Virgin and the child standing on a pedestal, flanked by angels and two saints. It was an altarpieced which was finished in 1517 for the convent of San Francesco dei Macci and nowadays it is conserved in a privilege position at the Uffizi gallery. Because of its stable lines (the triangle of the Madonna and the saints) the figures’ scheme has been copied several times. This masterpiece is consider one of the highest contribution to Renaissance art.

He is also known for his self portraits: one of them is shown at the National Gallery of London, and you can see many different one of course here in Florence at the gallery of Pitti Palace.

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When the procession passed the area of today’s piazza del Duomo – a tree grazed by San Zanobi’s bier began to sprout buds, new branches, and leaves – blooming in the heart of the winter.

This miracle is recalled by this column – and on the column in Gothic script almost illegible is the story and a darkened bronze relief of a tree in full bloom.

So every year I Fiorentini celebrate this miracle of San Zanobi on Jan 27, and decorate the base with flowers and greenery in his honor.

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Would you like to know something more about the great wonderful Dome ideated by Brunelleschi? At the Opera del Duomo’s website, there’s a special section dedicated to this famous piece. After 15 years of hard work, finally all the ancient documents have been digitalized and can be consulted by anyone. Check the following link – http://www.operaduomo.firenze.it/cupola/home_eng.html

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Once there was a womans’ Benedictine monastry, in which the abbess had the institutional duty to welcome the new bishop, when he was in visit to Florence. That’s why the Florentines, with their famous profanity, used to call her the bishop’s bride. The ancient romanic church, which had many changes and modifications during the years, can be seen in the Ghirlandaio’s San Zanobi’s miracle, set today at the Accademia museum.

The church was destroyed in 1783 because of its precary conditions; it all begun with the fell of a column, but the truth is that the duke Leopold II didn’t want to have too many religious istitution in the city of Florence. After the church, that area became a poor zone and lost its magnificence. What we can see now, it’s just three arches of the church’s ancient façade. Two of them are now part of private houses.

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An elaborate irrigation system brings water from the arno river to the gardens (which lack  a natural source of water); whithin the many sculptures and artworks which you will be pleased to admire walking around, you can find an amphitheater, an egyptian obelisque (brought from the Villa Medici in Rome), the Fountain of Neptune, with the sculpture of Neptune by Stoldo Lorenzi.

The Boboli gardens can be included in the program of guided visits of Florence or in the art history course offered by the Institute Galilei.

Designed by Giuseppe Poggioni, the square was buit in 1869, during the urban renewal of the town. Florence was the capital of Italy and during that period, the middle class strongly wanted to show its strong rebirth; there were created lungarni; on the right bank, instead of the fourteenth-century walls were open the avenues of the ring of a boulevard, on the left bank was traced, wind on the hill of San Miniato, the Viale dei Colli, a street tree overview 8 kilometers long, at whose climax the square was built as a terrace with a panoramic view inside the city.

The Michelangelo square, dedicated to the great Renaissance artist Michelangelo, has copies of some of his famous works in Florence: the David and the four allegories of the Medici Chapel of San Lorenzo. These copies are made of bronze, while the originals are all in white marble. The monument was brought up by nine pairs of oxen on 25 June 1873.

Poggi designed the loggia in the neoclassical style that dominates the whole terrace, which today houses a panoramic restaurant. Originally it was supposed to house a museum of works by Michelangelo, ever.

The view shows the heart of Florence from Forte Belvedere to Santa Croce lungarni through the bridges of Florence and in sequence, especially the Ponte Vecchio, are the Duomo, Palazzo Vecchio, the Bargello and the octagonal bell tower of the Badia Fiorentina, without forgetting opposed to the hills north of the city with the center and Settignano Fiesole.

The square can be accessed by car along the tree-Viale Michelangelo, made in those same years, or walk the stairs going up the ramps of the monumental Piazza Poggi Poggi in the district of San Niccolò.

(source: Wiki)

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The building, elevated above the level of the piazza by a set of steps running along the entire length of the façade, was constructed in several phases of which only the first was under Brunelleschi’s direct supervision. Since the loggia was started before the hospital was begun, the hospital was not formally opened until 1445.

Brunelleschi’s design was based on Classical Roman, Italian Romanesque and late Gothic architecture, but the use of round columns with classically correct capitals, in this case of the Composite Order, in conjunction with a dosseret (or impost blocks) was novel. So too, the circular arches and the segmented spherical domes behind them. The architectural elements were also all articulated in grey stone and set off against the white of the walls. This motif came to be known as pietra serena (Italian: dark stone). Also novel was the proportional logic. The heights of the columns, for example, was not arbitrary. If a horizontal line is drawn along the tops of the columns, a square is created out of the height of the column and the distance from one column to the next. This desire for regularity and geometric order was to become an important element in Renaissance architecture.

An important feature of the building are, of course, the “Tondi”, located above each column. In Brunelleschi’s original idea, they were supposed to be blank, but later Andrea della Robbia was commissioned to fill them in.

The design features a baby in swaddling clothes on a blue wheel, indicative of the horizontal wheel in the wall where babies could be rotated into the interior. A few of the tondi are still the original ones, but some are nineteenth century copies.

(source: Wikipedia)

The Ospedale degli Innocenti can be included in the Institute Galile’s art history and guided visits program.

But let’s talk about the funny piglet that you can see right in front of the building. This bronze wild boar is a reproduction of an Hellenistic statue which is in the Uffizzi, signed by Pietro Tacca. The piglet is a real touristic attraction, Wikipedia explains the reason:

“Popular tradition has it that rubbing the nose brings fortune, so that the statue has acquired over time a certain shine in that spot. Visitors are encouraged to place a coin in the mouth of the boar after rubbing its nose, and superstition implies that the wish will be granted if the offering tumbles through the grate whence the water flows.”

This place of interest can of course be included in one of the Institute Galilei’s guided tours of Florence.  Good luck, then!