Ninety Minutes on the Medici, with Every Statue in the Signoria Named

Via Camillo Cavour, 21R, Firenze

Note that 21 is a red number.

Palazzo Medici Riccardi

Michelozzo built the Palazzo Medici Riccardi for Cosimo il Vecchio after 1444, as his town house on the via Larga, now via Cavour. Beyond the exterior, what survives from that period is the main courtyard with its classical reliefs in the tondi, Michelozzo's small chapel on the first floor, and the frescoes Cosimo commissioned from Benozzo Gozzoli to decorate it.

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Basilica di San Lorenzo

The church was tied to the Medici from the moment they commissioned Brunelleschi to rebuild it in 1425, with their own money. Every principal member of the family from Cosimo il Vecchio to Cosimo III is buried here.

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Cappelle Medicee

The Cappella dei Principi is the mausoleum of the Medici grand dukes, and it does not undersell them. Ferdinando I ordered it built, and intended it faced in costly jasper. A back passage connects it to the New Sacristy, which Michelangelo built to balance Brunelleschi's Old Sacristy. Inside are the Medici tombs, with the statues Michelangelo carved for them.

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Cupola Del Brunelleschi

The dome of Santa Maria del Fiore was built by Brunelleschi, who worked for the Medici.

Piazza della Signoria

The 14th-century Palazzo Vecchio still dominates the square, with its crenellated tower. Around it stand the Loggia della Signoria, the Uffizi, the Palace of the Tribunale della Mercanzia and the Palazzo Uguccioni, whose facade is attributed to Raphael, who died thirty years before it was built. The statues around the square include: The copy of Michelangelo's David. The original is in the Galleria dell'Accademia. The equestrian monument to Cosimo I de' Medici, by Giambologna. The Fountain of Neptune, by Bartolomeo Ammannati. Il Marzocco, the lion, with a copy of the Florentine lily, originally by Donatello. Judith and Holofernes, by Donatello. Hercules and Cacus, by Bandinelli. The Rape of the Sabine Women, in the Loggia dei Lanzi, by Giambologna. Perseus with the Head of Medusa, in the Loggia dei Lanzi.

Uffizi

One of the most important museums in Italy and the most visited, and one of the largest and best known anywhere, holding a collection that has no price, particularly of the Italian Renaissance.

Palazzo Pitti

The Medici bought the palace in 1549 and it became the principal residence of the ruling families of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany. Successive generations turned it into a treasure house of paintings, plate, jewellery and everything else they could acquire.

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