YOUR FLORENCE EXPERIENCE

FINE ARTS AND
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Beyond Renaissance in Florence -San Giorgio dello Spirito Santo alla Costa

The restoration of the Church of San Giorgio dello Spirito Santo alla Costa  - once again the seat of a neighborhood parish -  financed by the Gianmaria Buccellati Foundation under the direction of the Superintendence of Fine Arts of Florence, has been completed.

We are in Costa San Giorgio, one of the most beautiful areas in the city center, on the Forte Belvedere hill,  just above the Boboli Gardens and Palazzo Pitti.
The church, that dates back to before 1000 AC, was transformed in 1520 into a chapel for the adjoining female convent founded by Lucrezia dei Medici, daughter of Lorenzo the Magnificent. It was then completely renovated in 1705-1708 by the great architect Giovan Battista Foggini.

The church is a masterpiece that still not much people know of,  one of the few examples in Florence of Rococo style.
Great elegance,
round and asymmetrical forms, an abundance of stuccoes, frames and gilded columns with richly decorated Corinthian capitels, characterize this church.
The atmosphere here is very far from
heaviness of the Baroque, we feel a different vision of the world and life,  joyful and positive. Bright spaces, light colors, gold, floreal decorations: it doesn't feel like entering a church, but rather a frivolous aristocratic salon.
Inside we can find paintings by Alessandro Gherardini (St. George in glory in the vault), Antonio Domenico Gabbiani (Descent of the Holy Spirit)
and Tommaso Redi (St. Benedict resurrecting a child ). The stuccos are by Giovan Battista Ciceri and the iron grates by Jacopo Pini.

The church, along with the adjoining building of the former convent, has been at the center of controversies. The hilly district of ​​Costa San Giorgio in the past few decades was completely depopulated and filled up with B&Bs, Hotels, Residences, luxury apartments mainly used by foreigners. There are also a few representative offices of famous fashion companies. People wonder: this is a neighborhood parish, but for who?
Furthermore, the buildings of the former convent (17,000 square meters) were sold by the Italian State to a multinational company. The plan is to build 120 luxury hotels and apartments, a restaurant, spaces for events, spas, underground car parks with a tunnel of 600 m, a lift coming from the base of the hill and a
rack funicular! All this in a place that has always been affected by landslides (it was once called Poggio delle Rovinate, meaning Hill of the Landslides). Apparently,  even Bernardo Buontalenti's house was destroyed by one of these landslides in 1500. The Municipality of Florence has not placed any constraints on the  area, rather it has allowed the property to be managed freely in regards of the surfaces, spaces and destination of use.
This is not the only case in Florence, unfortulately it is suffering the same fate of all the large historical complexes, which are becoming luxury resorts, transforming the city center irreversably.




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