Santissima Annunziata

In 1230, seven Florentine nobles had a spiritual crisis, gave away all their possessions, and retired to the forests to contemplate divinity. They returned to what were then the fields outside the city walls and founded a small oratory, proclaiming they were Servants of Mary, or the Servite Order. The oratory was enlarged by Michelozzo (1444-81) and later redesigned in the baroque. Under the facade's portico, you enter the Chiostro dei Voti (Votive Cloister), designed by Michelozzo with Corinthian-capitaled columns and decorated with some of the city's finest Mannerist frescoes (1465-1515). Rosso Fiorentino provided an Assumption (1513) and Pontormo a Visitation (1515) just to the right of the door, but the main works are by their master, Andrea del Sarto, whose Birth of the Virgin (1513), in the far right corner, is one of his finest works. To the right of the door into the church is a damaged but still fascinating Coming of the Magi (1514) by del Sarto, who included a self-portrait at the far right, looking out at us from under his blue hat. The interior is excessively baroque. Just to the left as you enter is a huge tabernacle hidden under a mountain of flowers and ex votos (votive offerings). It was designed by Michelozzo to house a small painting of the Annunciation. Legend holds that this painting was started by a friar who, vexed that he couldn't paint the Madonna's face as beautifully as it should be, gave it up and took a nap. When he awoke, he found an angel had filled in the face for him. Newlywed brides in Florence don't toss their bouquets -- they head here after the ceremony to leave their flowers at the shrine for good luck. The large circular tribune was finished for Michelozzo by Leon Battista Alberti. You enter it from its left side via the left transept, but first pause to pay your respects to Andrea del Sarto, buried under a floor slab at the left-hand base of the great arch. From the left transept, a door leads into the Chiostro dei Morti (Cloister of the Dead; track down a sacristan to open it), where over the entrance door is another of Andrea del Sarto's greatest frescoes, the Madonna del Sacco, illustrating the rest on the flight into Egypt, that got its name from the sack Joseph is leaning against to do a little light reading as he takes a breather. Also off this cloister is the Cappella di San Luca (Chapel of St. Luke), evangelist and patron saint of painters. It was decorated by late Renaissance and Mannerist painters, including Pontormo, Alessandro Allori, Santi di Tito, and Giorgio Vasari. On the piazza outside, flanked by elegant porticos, is an equestrian statue of Grand Duke Ferdinando I, Giambologna's last work; it was cast in 1608 after his death by his student Pietro Tacca, who also did the two little fountains of fantastic mermonkey-monsters. The piazza's beauty is somewhat ruined by the car and bus traffic routed through both ends, but it's kept lively by students from the nearby university, who sit on the loggia steps for lunch and hang out here in the evenings.