FLORENCE: Restorers launched a ground-breaking project in Florence’s historic Baptistery on Wednesday, allowing visitors a unique view of magnificent mosaics, including a three-headed devil which inspired Italian poet Dante.

For the next six years, tourists will be able to climb a specially-engineered, mushroom-shaped scaffold to examine up close over 1,000 square metres of richly-coloured and gold biblical depictions in the dome.

The cycle of medieval mosaics, made with an estimated 10 million tesserae measuring between five to 20 millimetres each, were designed by three generations of artists, including Cimabue, bel­ieved to be the painter Giotto’s teacher.

The ceiling of the octagonal Baptistery, which sits opposite the Duomo in Florence’s historic centre and which has hosted baptisms, including that of Dante Alighieri in 1266, was last restored over a century ago.

But now “there are cracks in every segment (of the dome) and a series of depressions... as well as detachments from the surface,” Beatrice Agostini, who oversees the restoration team, told.

Scaffolding for the ceiling work had to be designed in such a way as to keep doors open to the over one million people who visit the Tuscan city’s oldest religious monument every year. The solution was a “mushroom”, a central tower leading up to a 630-square-metre aluminium structure split over eight levels and hidden from the ground by a fabric “false ceiling”.

From February 24, visitors to the platform, which sits over 98 feet up, will climb to stand face to face with Christ, che­rubs, virgins, monks and monsters.

Published in Dawn, February 9th, 2023