A small room in Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, Italy, the Studiolo Francesco I de’ Medici was the secret refuge and private museum of the one-time Duke of Tuscany from 1574 to 1613. Created between... »

Museums and Collections, Wonder Cabinets | Edited by Annalisa and Nicholas Jackson

The biggest of the three grottoes - along with the Mose Grotto and the 19th-century Adam and Eve Grotto - in the area, Buontalenti roughly translates to, as one might suspect, large grotto. But... »

Architectural Oddities, Follies and Grottoes | Edited by Annalisa and Nicholas Jackson

When Giorgio Vasari undertook the restoration of the grand old Palazzo della Signoria, now known as the Palazzo Vecchio, he envisioned a new room adorned with maps of Italy and the known world,... »

Marvelous Maps and Measures, Repositories of Knowledge, Dead Explorers | Edited by Annetta and Dylan

A British interloper is memorialized in the Italian sanctuary of the Duomo, in Florence. The inscription under the huge fresco reads (translated), "John Hawkwood, British knight, most prudent... »

Unusual Monuments | Edited by Annetta

Florence in the 1400s had a problem. Babies. Babies everywhere. Babies in the fields, babies in the alleyways, babies left on the pews of the Church. Florence was crawling with abandoned babies.... »

Medical Museums, Unusual Monuments, Inspired Inventions | Edited by michelle and Annetta

Resting in the Dominican Church of San Marco in Florence is the 550 year-old mummified relic of St. Antoninus. His full body lies inside a glass coffin, dressed in his ornate archbishop’s garb. In... »

Relics and Reliquaries | Edited by Dylan, Henry and 2 others

It is a remarkable bit of irony, the finger: venerated, kept in a shrine, subjected to the same treatment as a saintly relic. But this finger belonged to no saint. It is the long bony finger of an... »

Relics and Reliquaries | Edited by Dylan, michelle and 2 others

The largest and best-known wax anatomical collection, La Specola is part of the Museum of Natural History in Florence and also houses some wonderful taxidermy, including some now extinct specimens... »

Museums and Collections, Medical Museums | Edited by Dylan, Henry and 2 others