Bartolini Salimbeni Chapel, Chapel in the Basilica of Santa Trinita, Florence, Italy

The Bartolini Salimbeni Chapel in Santa Trinita Church is a Gothic sanctuary decorated with frescoes and an altarpiece on its walls and ceiling. These paintings show scenes from the Virgin Mary's life in detailed composition.

The chapel belonged to the Bartolini-Salimbeni merchants from 1363; their palace stands in the same piazza as Santa Trinita. Around 1390 Spinello Aretino had already painted it, and traces of his work emerged during the 1961 restoration. Lorenzo Monaco's frescoes date to the 1420s, part of a redecoration of the whole church; they were plastered over in 1740 and uncovered in 1885–1887 by Augusto Burchi.

The chapel displays theological ideas about Mary's Immaculate Conception through its painted scenes. These narratives, taken from apocryphal sources, tell stories from her life that visitors can still see on the walls today.

The chapel underwent multiple restorations, particularly in 1961 and 2004, to repair war damage and protect the medieval paintings. Take time to study the fresco details in good lighting when you visit.

Lorenzo Monaco was mainly a miniaturist and panel painter; these frescoes are his only known substantial work in that medium. Whole figures are split across two or more days' plaster patches, and blue azurite skies and malachite greens have lost their dry-applied layers, so the red and turquoise preparation shows through.