Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
There are two entrances to the Santa Maria Novella complex: the main entrance to the
basilica or through the tourist office opposite the train station on Via de' Partzani. Firenze
Card holders are obliged to use the latter.
CHURCH
Chiesa di Santa Trìnita
(Piazza Santa Trìnita; 8am-noon & 4-5.45pm Mon-Sat, 8-10.45am & 4-7pm Sun)
Built in
Gothic style and later given a Mannerist facade, this 14th-century church shelters some of
the city's finest frescoes, including Lorenzo Monaco's
Annunciation
(1422) in the
Cappella
Salimbenes/Bartholini
and eye-catching frescoes by Ghirlandaio depicting the life of St
Francis of Assisi in the
Cappella Sassetti
, to the right of the altar. The latter were painted
between 1483 and 1485, and feature portraits of illustrious Florentines of the time.
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1
San Lorenzo
CHURCH
Basilica di San Lorenzo
(Piazza San Lorenzo; admission €4.50, with Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana €7; 10am-5.30pm Mon-
Sat, plus 1.30-5pm Sun Mar-Oct)
In 1425 Cosimo the Elder, who lived nearby, commissioned
Brunelleschi to rebuild the original 4th-century basilica on this site. The new building
would become the Medici parish church and mausoleum.
Considered one of the most harmonious examples of Renaissance architecture, the ba-
silica has never been finished. Michelangelo was commissioned to design the facade in
1518 but his design in white Carrara marble was never executed, hence the building's
rough unfinished appearance.
In the austere interior, columns of pietra serena (soft grey stone) crowned with Cor-
inthian capitals separate the nave from the two aisles. Donatello, who was still sculpting
the two bronze pulpits (1460-67) adorned with panels of the Crucifixion when he died, is
buried in the chapel featuring Fra' Filippo Lippi's
Annunciation
(c 1450). Left of the altar
is the
Sagrestia Vecchia
(Old Sacristy), designed by Brunelleschi and decorated in the main
by Donatello.
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