Palazzo Medici, Florence, Visitor Guide & Things to Do Nearby

Palazzo Medici Riccardi is the palace that launched the Renaissance. Built for Cosimo de' Medici between 1444 and 1484, it was the family's power base during their rise to dominance over Florence.

The palace was designed by Michelozzo di Bartolomeo. Cosimo had originally approached Brunelleschi, but rejected his design as too ostentatious. Michelozzo's building struck the right balance: grand enough to impress, modest enough not to inflame the jealousy of other Florentine families. The three-storey facade, with its rough-cut stone base giving way to smooth stone above, became the model for Renaissance palaces across Italy.

The palace's greatest treasure is the Chapel of the Magi, painted by Benozzo Gozzoli around 1459. The fresco depicts the Journey of the Magi but is really a portrait of the Medici family and their circle, including Lorenzo de' Medici as a young man, dressed in the finest clothes of the era. It is one of the most luminous and detailed frescoes of the entire Renaissance.

In 1659, the Riccardi family purchased the palace for 40,000 scudi and added a Baroque mirror gallery with a spectacular ceiling fresco by Luca Giordano (1682-1685).

Today, the palace serves as the seat of the Metropolitan City of Florence and houses libraries and exhibition spaces. If you're on a Questo quest through Florence, Palazzo Medici is a stop where the family that bankrolled the Renaissance built their headquarters.