The restoration of the Hall of Geographical Maps in Palazzo Vecchio has been completed following three years of work, during which an important discovery was made, and a 3D digital model created to enable virtual visits of the highly popular space. The works were carried out thanks to the support of the Friends of Florence Foundation, with a generous donation by the Giorgi Family Foundation.
The 53 geographical maps and large terrestrial globe in the centre of the room have been finely restored with increased legibility due to new lighting and cutting-edge techniques. The maps of the world as it was known in the mid-late 16th century were painted in oil on wooden cabinet doors that were designed by the Dominican cosmographer Egnazio Danti and the Olivetan monk Stefano Bonsignori (1563-1586). The 13 walnut cabinets with decorative carvings by Dionigi di Matteo Nigetti (1564-1571) received maintenance, with the plexiglass panels that were on the painted tables replaced with anti-reflective sheets. The cabinets were originally intended to conserve the most precious objects from Grand Duke Cosimo I de’ Medici‘s collections.
The Sala della Guardaroba, commonly known as the Sala delle Carte Geografiche, was inaugurated on November 27 with the room never having closed to the public over the course of the works, apart from a brief closure to allow for the resurfacing of the flooring. The work was curated by the Servizio Belle Arti e Fabbrica of Palazzo Vecchio and the Servizio Tecnici department, with the collaboration of the Servizio Musei della direzione Cultura.
At the same time as the restoration, Museo Galileo, with the support of Friends of Florence and through an agreement with the Municipality, created a website that enables an interactive 3D exploration of the room and the works, which have been completely digitally reconstructed. The website includes nine films dedicated to the leading figures involved in the room’s creation, including the Grand Duke Cosimo de’ Medici, and Giorgio Vasari and Antonio Lupicini, the architects and designers of machinery that was intended to create fascinating apparatus that would move the cosmographic contents of the room, but which was never realized. The 3D exploration of the room enables you to consult the contents in detail, clicking on the globe and each individual map to admire the details through significant levels of magnification, and reading the texts that describe the geographical characteristics, history and customs of the populations in every part of the known world.
Over the course of the restoration, a significant historical discovery was made, which will be detailed in a soon-to-be published volume by the Florence-based Mandragora publishing house: it has been proven that the globe was entirely remade by the last cosmographer of the Medici court, Matteo Neroni, between 1605 and 1613. We now know that practically nothing remains of the first version of the globe made by Egnazio Danti (1564-1569), except the external metal support structure and, perhaps, the main elements of the internal iron framework, which were both made at the time by the architect and engineer Antonio Lupicini.
