Florence and the Medici Tours / The Convent and the National Museum of San Marco

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In the same years he was working on the construction of Palazzo Medici, the architect Michelozzo rebuilt for Cosimo the Elder the crumbling Convent of San Marco, assigned to the Dominican order. Here the friar-painter Fra Giovanni Angelico (Beato Angelico) painted an important cycle of frescoes and Fra Girolamo Savonarola, who inspired the birth of the Florentine Republic after the expulsion of the Medici, was prior, before being excommunicated by Pope Alexander VI Borgia and sentenced to death.

From the elegant cloister of Saint Antonino we will pass in the Chapter Hall to admire the moving Crucifixion of Beato Angelico and in the Small Refectory where there is the fresco of the Last Supper by Domenico Ghirlandaio. The ancient Ospizio dei Pellegrini (Pilgrim Hospice) adjacent to the cloister now houses the largest collection of panel paintings by Beato Angelico. Recently refurbished and equipped with a new modern lighting system, this fascinating room reopened to the public with the new name of 'Sala del Beato Angelico' on Januari 21, 2021.

On the upper floor the 45 monk's cells entirely frescoed by the Tuscan painter and his collaborators with stories of Christ will make us immerse in the spiritual and contemplative world of a Dominican monastery of the fifteenth century. The austere and luminous Michelozzo Library, divided into three naves by slender Ionic columns, is another architectural jewel of the famous architect.