The overlooked corners inside

• Vasari Corridor

  Look up at the row of small windows running along the top of the Ponte Vecchio and you're looking at an invisible power route. The Vasari Corridor is an elevated passageway — roughly 760 metres long — that links the Palazzo Vecchio through the Uffizi, across the top of the Ponte Vecchio, and all the way to the Palazzo Pitti on the far bank. Cosimo I de' Medici ordered Giorgio Vasari to build it in 1565, so that the Medici family could move quickly and safely between their residence and the seat of government at a time when the city was still half-suspicious of the new regime. Most striking is the build time: work began on 12 March and the corridor was complete by 17 December of the same year — nine months, start to finish.

  Sources: it.wikipedia.org

• Contini Bonacossi Collection

  The paintings, sculptures and decorative objects hanging in this section of the Uffizi are the survivors of a tug-of-war that nearly sent the collection abroad. The Contini Bonacossi Collection (*collezione Contini Bonacossi*) was the private holding of Alessandro Contini Bonacossi (1878–1955), an antique dealer and collector, and his wife Vittoria. Their heirs donated it to the Uffizi in 1969. Mussolini had made Alessandro a life senator of the Kingdom of Italy; in return, Alessandro promised to keep the collection in Italy, while retaining the right to use it during his lifetime.

  Sources: it.wikipedia.org

• Drawings and Prints Room

  This room holds the Uffizi's least-visited and arguably most significant collection: around 150,000 drawings, prints and miniatures spanning the late fourteenth century to the twenty-first. It occupies the ground floor of the museum, in a space rebuilt from what was once the Medici Theatre (*Teatro Mediceo*). The roots of the collection go back to the Medici themselves — Lorenzo the Magnificent already had drawings in the family holdings, and Cosimo I, according to Vasari, owned 'various drawings, sketches and cartoons' by Michelangelo and Piero di Cosimo; under Francesco I the collection expanded to include large holdings of drawings by Giuliano da Sangallo, Michelangelo and Leonardo. The collection's modern scale was established by Cardinal Leopoldo, brother of Ferdinando II: he sent agents across Italy and beyond to buy drawings by both contemporary and old masters, and by around 1665 the historian Filippo Baldinucci had catalogued approximately 12,000 items.

  Sources: it.wikipedia.org

• Uffizi Library

  The floor beneath your feet in the Uffizi Library once held an audience of three hundred. The space was originally the Teatrino della Baldracca — a small hall named after the neighbourhood's disreputable past (brothels and taverns clustered nearby, giving the *Baldracca* quarter its name) — where paying members of the middle class could watch *commedia dell'arte* performances. In the early eighteenth century Pietro Leopoldo commissioned architect Giovan Battista Foggini to convert the theatre into a library; Foggini also designed the shelves and cabinets that are still in use today.

  Sources: it.wikipedia.org

• Room of Niobe

  The Room of Niobe was the most severely damaged space in the 1993 bomb attack. On the night of 27 May of that year, the Mafia detonated a car bomb on the Via dei Georgofili (see the Via dei Georgofili bombing entry), killing five people and causing heavy damage to several rooms in the Uffizi's west wing. The classical sculptures and neoclassical interior of the Room of Niobe were badly hit; the room's frescoed ceiling was subsequently assessed as beyond repair, though the room itself has been restored and is open to visitors. Some paintings in the museum survived because they were protected by bullet-proof glass; five artworks were completely destroyed in the blast.

  Sources: en.wikipedia.org

• Uffizi Gallery

  The Uffizi Gallery (*Galleria delle pitture e delle statue degli Uffizi*) is a painting an… 🔒 Unlock the full guide

  Sources: fr.wikipedia.org

• Tribune

  The Tribune (*Tribuna degli Uffizi*) is the octagonal hall at the end of the east corridor… 🔒 Unlock the full guide

  Sources: it.wikipedia.org

• Door of Petitions

  The Door of Petitions (*Porta delle Suppliche*) is a gateway on the Via Lambertesca side o… 🔒 Unlock the full guide

  Sources: it.wikipedia.org

• Via dei Georgofili Bombing

  In the early hours of 27 May 1993, a car bomb exploded on the Via dei Georgofili, killing… 🔒 Unlock the full guide

  Sources: it.wikipedia.org

• Orcagna, St Matthew and Scenes from His Life

  This large triptych carries an unfinished story. On 15 July 1367, the Florentine Money Cha… 🔒 Unlock the full guide

  Sources: uffizi.it · en.wikipedia.org

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