The history of the Loggia begins more than 150 years ago, when in 1865 the engineer Giuseppe Poggi was put in charge of embellishing Florence for the arrival of the government and the Piedmontese “Royal family and bureaucrats that lower the reluctance of the banks of the Arno to manage from here Italy reunited under a unique reign.”
The 15th of September 1865 in Paris was signed the Italian-French Convention that stated the withdrawal of the Napolean trups Vatican State, and on the 3rd of February 1965 Florence was proclaimed Capital of the Italian Republic.
Part of the ancient walls were destroyed to make room for roads that surrounded the center of the city and that are still present today; these climbing up Viale dei Colli reached the natural terrace overlooking Florence: Piazzale Michelangelo.
Poggi’s intention was to transform the Loggia on a Michelangelo-centered museum, unfortunately this remained just a dream as the artworks never arrived, but the intellectual spirits yes and the Loggia became an Historical Italian Café that during the years has seen many important names sit at its tables and in its halls, like the statesmen Bettino Ricasoli and Giovanni Spadolini; poets and writers like Papini and Montale, Bo, Palazzeschi and Luzi, Maccari and Malaparte.
The Loggia reached its peak of splendor between 1855 and 1866, welcoming intense and animated discussions of the Macchiaioli painters becoming one of the most vivid centers of the cultural and artistic Florentine debate.
The game of volumes and geometries of the Loggia with its columns, its arches, the galleries and the halls was thought to create a metaphysical location of encounters. Of Meditation. A shelter for art works and intellectuals.
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