San Lorenzo, Church and Cloisters, Florence, Italy
| General Attributes |
DOI| 10.34946/D61P4H | |
| Project Name | San Lorenzo, Church and Cloisters, Florence |
| Country | Italy |
| Status | Restricted |
| Citation |
| George Bent, Dave Pfaff, Florence As It Was, Contributor3 2026: San Lorenzo, Church and Cloisters, Florence - LiDAR - Terrestrial. Distributed by Open Heritage 3D. https://doi.org/10.34946/D61P4H |
| Data Type |
Size |
Device Name |
Device Type |
| LiDAR - Terrestrial | Not available | Not available | Not available |
| Background |
| Site Description | This building’s history runs backwards. An important church of unknown origins was located on this site during the early Middle Ages and, according to archival information, served at one point as the city’s cathedral. By 1420, however, the building had fallen into disrepair and was the center of a neighborhood known more for the prevalence of prostitutes working the streets ringing the church than anything else. Nonetheless, its most important parishioner, Giovanni di Bicci de’Medici (father of Cosimo il Vecchio), selected it as his burial site and entrusted Filippo Brunelleschi with the designs for renovations of the sacristy in the southwest wing of the transept, which were completed by 1429. Donatello contributed sculptural designs inside the space during the succeeding years, including bronze reliefs for two doors and terra cotta roundels in the spandrels above, much to the architect’s dismay. This ‘Old Sacristy’ stood next to the dilapidated ancient church until a group of neighbors led by Cosimo agreed in 1442 to fund the demolition of the original structure and complete reconstruction of a new edifice. The ensuing basilica employs features commonly associated with Brunelleschian design features: A methodical employment of geometric volumes formed by a proportional system of ratios that create a harmonious interior articulated by grey ‘pietra serena’ stone, white plastered walls, and modulated chapel spaces. As such, the nave, side aisles, and transept stem from the designs of the Old Sacristy that preceded it by some fifteen years. Although no documents support his participation in the project, few (if any) oppose the notion that the blueprints for this church were drawn by Filippo Brunelleschi before his death in 1446. A second sacristy was added during the first quarter of the 16th century by Michelangelo, whose designs of the New Sacristy for the Medicean inheritors of the new Duchy of Tuscany included tombs marked by large sculptural allegories of Dawn, Dusk, Day, and Night.
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| Project Description | Florence As It Was has multiple aims within its broad goal of recreating selected structures in the city as they appeared in the year 1500. The pointclouds and photogrammetric models we build certainly serve their purposes as visual portals into the past, but the translations of early modern descriptions, transcriptions of contemporary documents, and the creation of a database of people, places, and things weaves these images into layers of information that help us interpret what we see. Intended as a study tool (as opposed to a substitution for the real thing), this project provides users with a combination of the type of original source materials that historians of art and architecture in particular typically use when crafting scholarly works. Its multi-variances routinely force us to make choices and adhere to a list of priorities as we go. We have progressed deliberately and with an eye toward posting the most original portions of our work first, and then filling in the gaps later on. We have concentrated much of our attention on the physically and politically challenging work of securing permissions, traveling to Florence, and then using state-of-the-art technology to scan the most important structures in the city before editing and modeling those scans so that they reflect accurately the dimensions and color patterns of those buildings.
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| UNESCO World Heritage Site | Historic Centre of Florence |
| External Project Link | View exhibit |
| Collection Date | 2021-06-01 to 2025-02-25 |
| Publication Date | 2026-03-19 |
| License Type | Restricted |
| Model Information |
| Reuse Score | B - High-Quality Model without Georeferencing |
| Curator Notes | This dataset is restricted, to request access please consult the Florence as It Was Project
https://florenceasitwas.wlu.edu/
florenceasitwas@wlu.edu
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