San Lorenzo Church

Just in front of VipFlorence, The Basilica di San Lorenzo (Basilica of St Lawrence) is one of the largest churches of Florence, situated at the centre of the city’s main market district, and the burial place of all the principal members of the Medici family from Cosimo il Vecchio to Cosimo III. It is one of several churches that claim to be the oldest in Florence; when it was consecrated in 393[1] it stood outside the city walls. For three hundred years it was the city's cathedral before the official seat of the bishop was transferred to Santa Reparata. San Lorenzo was also the parish church of the Medici family. In 1419, Giovanni di Bicci de' Medici offered to finance a new church to replace the 11th-century Romanesque rebuilding. Filippo Brunelleschi, the leading Renaissance architect of the first half of the 15th century, was commissioned to design it, but the building, with alterations, was not completed until after his death.

The church interior is divided in three naves and each one is composed of arches: all this, thanks to candid colours, creates a suggestive atmosphere. The church was embellished by the most famous artists of the period and today we can still admire its integrity despite the continual remaking during the XIX century. The old sacristy is a work of Brunelleschi and decorated with frescoes by Donatello. In the sacristy 's dome we can see a fresco which represents a small planetary in which are represented, with unique precision, the heavenly bodies with which the Florentine sky was composed in the summer of 1442. In the new sacristy there are tombs of Lorenzo il Magnifico and Giuliano, made and placed according to a project of Michelangelo. Of noteworthy interest is also the Cappella Medicea; from here it is easy to reach the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana in which is kept a collection of manoscritti of great prestige.