Their work - as well as that of many other generations of artists up to the present time - are collected in the many museums of the city: the Uffizi, the most select picture gallery in the World; the Galleria Palatina, with its "golden age" paintings: the Bargello, with its Renaissance sculptures; the Academy, the Medici Chapel and the Buonarroti House, with Michaelangeb's sculptures; the Bardi, Home, Stibbert, Romano Museums, the Modern Art Gallery, the Museum of the Duomo, the Silver Museum and the Pietre Dure Museum (the museum of semiprecious stones).

Famous monuments indicate the various stages of Florentine art: the Baptistry with its mosaics; the Duomo with its sculptures; medieval churches 'with their frescoes; public and private palaces - the Palazzo Vecchio, Palazzo Pitti, Palazzo Medici Riccardi, Palazzo Davanzati; monasteries and cloisters; convents and "cenacoli"; the Certosa. The Etruscan civilization is well represented in the Archaeological Museum.

Museo Nazionale del Bargello
This building dates from 1255, when it was built as the seat of the "Capitano del Popolo", the commander of the local militia. Later it became the seat of the "Podestà" and then of the Capitano di Giustizia (the magistrate) or "Bargello", from which it gets its name. Since 1859 it has been the home of the National Museum dedicated to sculpture and the minor arts. It contains masterpieces by Brunelleschi, Michelangelo, Cellini, Giambologna, and Donatello along with priceless ivories, enamels, jewels, tapestries and weapons.
Address: Via Proconsolo 4
Tel: +39 (0)55 – 2388606
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Openings=9am-2pm - closed Mon. / Entrance L. 8.000

Museo dell’Opera di Santa Croce
The Museo dell’Opera contains renowned artworks such as the "Crucifix" by Cimabue, frescoes by Taddeo Gaddi and Andrea Orcagna and the graceful Pazzi Chapel designed by Brunelleschi.
Address: Piazza S. Croce, 16
Tel: +39 (0)55 - 244619
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openings=summer: 10am-12.30pm - 2.30-6.30pm / winter: 10am-12.30 pm - 3-5pm - Closed Wed, Entr. L 3.000

Museum of Santa Maria Novella
The Museo di Santa Maria Novella is adjacent to the church. Here you can admire the splendid Green Cloister frescoed by Paolo Uccello and his school. In the Chapter Room, known as the "Cappellone degli Spagnoli" is a famous fresco by Bonaiuto. Just a short distance from the church is the Officina Profumo Farmaceutica di Santa Maria Novella, where perfumes, soaps and fragrances are made and sold in a Neogothic setting.
Address: Piazza Santa Maria Novella
Tel: +39 (0)55 - 282187
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Carnielo Gallery

Address: Piazza Savonarola 3
Tel: +39 (0)55 - 2616539
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Palatine Gallery

Address: inside Pitti Palace
Tel: +39 (0)55 - 2388611
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openings=9am- 7pm, closed on Mondays, entrance L 12.000

Sinagogue and Jewish Museum of Florence

Address: Via Farini, 4
Tel: +39 (0)55 - 245252
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openings=Sun & Thu 10am-lpm & 2-5pm, Fri 10am-lpm. Entrance L 5.000

Museo Marino Marini
The deconsecrated church of S. Pancrazio houses the museum dedicated to Marino Marini, one of the foremost 20th century Italian sculptors. Near the museum, in the Rucellai Chapel is the extraordinary Temple of the Holy Sepulchre by Leon Battista Alberti.
Address: Piazza S. Pancrazio
Tel: +39 (0)55 - 219432
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openings=10am-5pm (Thu till 10pm), closed on Tuesdays and Sundays, entrance L.8.000

Uffizi Gallery – Galleria degli Uffizi
The Uffizi Gallery, founded in Florence in 1581, by the De Medici family, is one of the oldest museums in the world. Many important works of Italian and other schools, dating from between the fourteenth and eighteenth centuries, are kept here, including the largest existing collection of Tuscan Renaissance paintings.

The Uffizi Palace was constructed in the mid-sixteenth century by the architect Giorgio Vasari (1511-1574) in the period when Cosimo de' Medici, first Grand Duke of Tuscany, was bureaucratically consolidating his recent takeover of power. Built in the form of a horse shoe extending from Piazza Signoria to the River Arno and linked with Palazzo Vecchio by a bridge over the street, the Uffizi were intended to house the offices of the magistrature (Uffizi = offices). From the beginning however, the Medici set aside certain rooms on the third floor to house the finest works from their collections; two centuries later, in 1737, thanks to the far-seeing generosity of the last heir of the family, Anna Maria Luisa, their collection became permanent public property. The Gallery now consists of forty-five rooms where the paintings are arranged in chronological order from the thirteenth to the eighteenth centuries. Among them are some of the most famous and representative paintings of Italian, and in particular Tuscan, art, but there are also important sections devoted to Flemish, French, Dutch and German painters. Apart from its paintings, the Uffizi exhibits ancient Roman sculpture and sixteenth century sculpture; these are all seen in the three corridors whose ceilings are frescoed with grotesques.

On the ground floor the remains of the old Romanesque church of S. Pier Scheraggio partly destroyed by Vasari to build the Uffizi, have been recently restored; the frescoes of "Famous Men" by Andrea del Castagno (1421-c. 1457) are exhibited here. On the second floor is the Prints and Drawings Department, housing a very rich collection begun by Cardinal Leopoldo de' Medici (17th century). Occasional public exhibitions in the adjoining room show selections from this collection. The Uffizi is the most important and most visited museum of Florence. Following their natural layout, we find in the first of the rooms the great altarpieces of Cimabue and Giotto, humanized images of God and the earliest examples of the new art the Renaissance. After these comes the Sienese elegance of Duccio, Simone Martini and Lorenzetti, together with the robust school of Giotto (13th-15th centuries; Rooms 3 & 4).

Then follows the International Gothic Style; two examples of the Adoration of the Magi by Gentile da Fabriano and Lorenzo Monaco (early 15th century; Rooms 5 & 6).

The Uffizi's best-known rooms are dedicated to Florentine painting on the eve of the Renaissance (15th century); in Room 7 we find works by Masaccio, Paolo Uccello, Domenico Veneziano, Fra' Angelico and Piero della Francesca. Then follow the elegant Madonnas of Filippo Lippi, Pollaiolo's delightful little panels, and finally, in the newly-restored main room the mythological allegories and religious paintings of Botticelli. This unique group includes the Birth of Venus, the Primavera, the Madonnas "of the Magnificat" and "of the Pomegranate". Passing to Leonardo da Vinci and Verrocchio (Room 15) we find the Baptism of Christ by both masters, and the Adoration of the Magi by Leonardo alone. The following rooms (16-23) are the oldest, in the gallery and the Tribuna deserves a special visit as the former setting for the most precious works of art in the collection. After this is a series of rooms used by the Medici as armouries and now containing more Renaissance works by Bellini, Giorgione, Perugino, Signorelli and the German and Flemish schools including Durer, Cranach, Memmling and David (15th - 16th centuries).

After the Miniature Room and the Second Corridor with its splendid view of the Arno, Room 25 opens the series of rooms devoted to sixteenth century painting. With the Holy Family ("The Doni Tondo") by Michelangelo are found the works of Raphael (Madonna of the Goldfinch) and Titian (Venus of Urbino, Flora). The section of Mannerist paintings is particularly rich, ranging from Pontormo to Rosso Fiorentino, Bronzino and Parmigianino (Madonna with the Long Neck). Venetian art of the period is well represented by Sebastiano del Piombo, Veronese and the room dedicated to Tintoretto. Barocci of Urbin also has a special room, where his Madonna of the People is shown, and El Greco is represented by Two Saints, acquired recently. Room 41 contains the works of Rubens, (1577-1640). The Uffizi owns the robust but affectionate portrait of the artist's wife and the two huge canvases with the Triumphs of Henry IV of France. The seventeenth century is well represented by Caravaggio (Young Bacchus, Abraham and Isaac), Annibale Carracci (Baccante), and Claude Lorrain (Seaport with Villa Medici) followed by an exceptional collection of Dutch and Flemish subject pictures and genre (Room 44).

The 18th century Niobe Room with its white and gold plasterwork contains the marble group of Niobe and her Children for which it was specially constructed.

Italian and French eighteenth century paintings are preserved in the Gallery's last room and include Tiepolo, Guardi, Nattier, Chardin and Goya, all representing the finest art of the late eighteenth century and the early nineteenth.

The visitor to the Uffizi may also visit the famous Vasari corridor linking the Uffizi and Pitti Palaces across the Ponte Vecchio. Apart from the delightful views of the city through the corridor's circular windows, its entire length contains around 700 works, some of the 17th and 18th centuries in addition to the celebrated and unique self-portrait collection. (A visit to the corridor may be booked in advance through the Museum secretary).

The Uffizi Gallery