Restoration work has been completed on the Terrace of Juno, a small room in the Palazzo Vecchio famous for its scenes from ancient mythology.
The terrace was constructed under Grand Duke Cosimo I de’ Medici in the south-east wing of the Palazzo Vecchio. It was conceived as part of the Quartiere degli Elementi, a complex of guest rooms built between 1551 and 1555 by Battista del Tasso. By 1557, Giorgio Vasari and other artists had furnished it with its panels and frescoes of classical myths.
The terrace’s name derives from the fact that it was originally not an enclosed space but a loggia looking out over north-east Florence. This loggia was meant to have been home to a statue of the Roman goddess Juno: the statue was never made, but a niche in one of the walls shows where it would have stood.
Terrace of Juno, ceiling frescoes
A bronze putto by Andrea del Verrocchio has also been restored and returned to the terrace, having been exhibited as nearby as Palazzo Strozzi and as far as Washington, D.C. The restoration of the putto, which carries a dolphin-shaped vase, was made possible by advanced technology, including ultrasound equipment, to show where previous restoration work had been done.
The restoration of the terrace and the putto cost 60,000 euro in total, and was funded by the Friends of Florence Foundation.
