All Museums in Tuscany

Palazzo della Fraternita dei Laici is a historic palace overlooking Piazza Grande, the monumental heart of Arezzo. Construction began during the fourteenth century, but the building developed through several distinct phases, combining medieval stonework, Renaissance sculpture and sixteenth-century architectural additions within a single façade. Palazzo della Fraternita dei Laici occupies a prestigious position between the apse of the Church of Santa Maria della Pieve and the Logge Vasari. Its location reflects the importance acquired by the Fraternita dei Laici, an institution established in Arezzo in 1262 and closely connected with the city’s social, charitable and cultural development. Originally known as the Fraternita di Santa Maria della Misericordia, the organization assisted poor residents, transported and buried the dead and administered donations received from local benefactors. It gradually accumulated enough property and financial resources to support hospitals, schools, public infrastructure, artistic commissions and cultural institutions. Palazzo della Fraternita dei Laici is especially recognizable for its façade, where the Gothic lower level is joined to a Renaissance upper section and a bell gable designed by Giorgio Vasari. The latter contains an astronomical clock constructed in 1552 and still operated through its historic mechanical system. The building now accommodates the Fraternita dei Laici Museum, Read more [...]

Palazzo Giuli Rosselmini Gualandi is a palace in Pisa, located on Lungarno Gambacorti, near the Church of Santa Cristina. The palace has recently become known as Palazzo Blu (Blue Palace), because of the restored color of its plasterwork.   SHORT HISTORY On November 14, 1356, Doge Giovanni Dell’Agnello, owner of some properties in the area, obtained permission to enlarge some of his buildings, thus raising the first nucleus of the palace, a structure composed of large pillars, with two or more modules, joined to form ogival arches, filled with bricks and decorated with single mullioned windows. During the first Florentine domination, between 1406 and 1494, the building underwent considerable changes, due to the decline of the Dell’Agnello family. Passed to the Municipality at the end of the 14th century, it became the property of the Republic of Florence, which used it as the headquarters for the five supervisors of the occupied city, until it was given back to Giovan Bernardino Dell’Agnello. Towards the end of the 16th century, the complex was transformed by the families of Sancasciano and Del Testa. It was precisely Emilio Del Testa, who in 1593 radically transformed the building to a sumptuous late-Renaissance palace, applying a Read more [...]

Palazzo Reale is a large palace in Pisa, located on the northern bank of the Arno River, on Lungarno Antonio Pacinotti, at number 46. Today, the palace hosts the National Museum of the Royal Palace (Museo Nazionale di Palazzo Reale).   SHORT HISTORY Palazzo Reale (Royal Palace) was built in 1583 by Bernardo Buontalenti for Francesco I de’ Medici, to replace the Medici Palace located near the Church of San Matteo. The palace was built by merging some medieval buildings dating back to the 11th and 12th centuries and partly still visible – that of the Counts Gaetani of Terriccio, Pomaya and d’Oriseo (the Tower of the Verga d’Oro and the Tower of the Canton), and was remodeled several times, during the 17th and 19th centuries. On an alley behind the palace, we can see the round arches of a medieval building, now lowered due to the rising of the floor, and in the courtyard, there is an ancient tower, with an arched portal, two small windows with a pentagonal architrave and a single-lancet window higher up. On the ground floor of the courtyard, we can also find the remains of a loggia, with two columns with capitals, partially abraded. Read more [...]

Buy tickets & tours:GetYourGuide Palazzo Pitti is an imposing Renaissance-style palace in Florence, located in Piazza dei Pitti. The palace was the residence of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, and was inhabited, over time, by the Medici family, by the Habsburg-Lorraine and, after the Unification of Italy, by the Savoy. Palazzo Pitti hosts the Palatine Gallery, the Royal Apartments, the Apartment of the Duchess of Aosta, the Gallery of Modern Art, the Treasury of the Grand Dukes of Tuscany, the Costume Gallery, the Porcelain Museum and the Carriage Museum. The museal complex of Palazzo Pitti also includes the Boboli Gardens.   SHORT HISTORY Luca Pitti, a rival of the Medici family, desired a more luxurious palace than the one built by Michelozzo for Cosimo the Elder. Around 1440, Pitti entrusted the project to Filippo Brunelleschi, but the architect died long before the construction began, and the project passed to his pupil, Luca Fancelli. The construction was started around 1458, but, due to various design problems and financial difficulties, the works were temporarily interrupted in 1465. Luca Pitti died in 1472. Around 1550, Buonaccorso Pitti sold the palace to Eleonora di Toledo, wife of Cosimo I de’ Medici and daughter of Read more [...]

Buy tickets & tours:GetYourGuide The Uffizi Gallery (Galleria degli Uffizi) is the most visited Italian museum and the 11th art museum in the world, by the number of visits, with over 3 million visitors in 2016. Situated near Piazza della Signoria, in the historical center of Florence, the museum houses a collection of priceless works of art, most of them from the period of the Italian Renaissance.   SHORT HISTORY The building of the Uffizi Gallery was erected starting with 1560, at the request of Grand Duke of Tuscany, Cosimo I de’ Medici. The original architect was Giorgio Vasari, one of the leading architects of the 15th century. The initial role of the building was to shelter the municipal offices (uffizi), hence the name, but for the next two hundred years the space brought together under one roof the art collections of the Grand Dukes of Tuscany. In 1737, the last member of the Medici family, Anna Maria Luisa, decided to leave the art collections to the city of Florence. In 1769, the place was opened to the public, the first in Europe to be called a “museum”.   ART The art inside the Uffizi includes ancient and modern paintings Read more [...]