Florence - Palazzo Pitti

The Palazzo Pitti ranks as Florence's most importance palazzo together with the Palazzo Vecchio (they are joined by a passage) and the Palazzo Medici-Riccardi. Its size is impressive - it covers a surface area of 32,000 sq. m/344,320 sq. ft, and its facade is 205m/224yd across, and 36m/118ft high at the center - and so is its architecture, an effect that is heightened by the way the square fronting it slopes slightly uphill towards it.

The art gallery (Galleria Palatina or Pitti) in the Palazzo Pitti is one of the most important in the world, almost on a par, so far as works of art are concerned, with the collections of the Uffizi. The palace also houses the Museo degli Argenti (Silver Museum), the Galleria d'Arte Moderna (Gallery of Modern Art), the Contini Bonacassi collection, the Museo delle Carrozze (Carriage Museum) and the Appartamenti ex Reali (Royal Apartments). In the adjoining Palazzina della Meridiana are the Galleria del Costume and the Collezione Contini Bonacossi.

A respected and wealthy Florentine merchant family, the Pittis were equal to the Medici in terms of pride and ambition. Consequently in 1447 Luca Pitti laid plans for a magnificent palace on the left bank of the Arno a little above the town. The architect Luca Fancelli was in charge of the preliminary work (1457-1466), possibly based on designs by Brunelleschi. Between 1558 and 1570 the wife of Cosimo I, Eleonora of Toledo, who had acquired the palace in 1549, had it completely renovated and considerably enlarged by Bartolomeo Ammanati, who was followed by other architects, interior designers and artists.

The new owners, the Medici, and Cosimo III in particular, purchased valuable pictures to decorate the apartments. These form the basis of the Galleria Palatina. Classical and contemporary statues were also added.

The Palazzo Pitti became the residence of the Italian kings (1864-1871) when Florence was the capital of a partially united Italy. In 1919 King Victor Emanuel III finally gave it to the city, which had the museums enlarged.

Architecture at its most creative can be seen in the facade of the palace with its massive ashlar stonework, high-vaulted windows and stepped storys, and in the Rondò di Bacco, the Mannerist courtyard by Ammanati (1558-1570), looking like a grotto enlivened by "rustication". Adjoining it is the terrace of the Boboli Gardens with its fountains and statuary.