A central dome dominates this space, while greyish-green stone articulates its perfect geometry.
A-Level: Religious architecture in Florence + Rome + Venice
Romanesque, Gothic, or ancient Greek? Whether you divide this façade by styles or squares, its stones come alive.
Alberti, Façade of Santa Maria Novella, Florence
Night and day, rough and polish—this chapel embodies opposition and traps the viewer in a moment of transition.
Michelangelo, Medici Chapel (New Sacristy)
Squaring the circle? At this burial site, pendentives unite the dome of heaven and the gravity of earth.
Brunelleschi, Old Sacristy, San Lorenzo, Florence
Renaissance Florence, or ancient Rome? This church remade the classical. It’s energetic and dense, but also severe.
Filippo Brunelleschi, Santo Spirito, Florence
This treasure of a building marks the site of St. Peter’s crucifixion. Its ideal geometry looks back to antiquity.
Donato Bramante, Tempietto, Rome
From granary to—church? Once open to the city, this building and its niches blend the spiritual with the everyday.
Orsanmichele and Donatello’s Saint Mark, Florence
Down and out, but still afloat. This huge, hollow dome stays put thanks to its skeletal ribs and “girdle.”
Filippo Brunelleschi, Dome of the Cathedral of ...
The greatest minds of the High Renaissance worked on this vast church. Construction took more than a century.
Saint Peter’s Basilica
Three ancient Roman forms combine to bring the grandeur of classical architecture into a Christian context.
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