The Nomboli snack bar has plenty of outdoor seating

©Jo-Ann Titmarsh/Lonely Planet

Battistero di San Giovanni

Duomo & Piazza della Signoria


This 11th-century baptistry – the oldest religious building on the vast cathedral square – is a Romanesque, octagonal-striped structure of white-and-green marble with three sets of doors conceived as panels illustrating the story of humanity and the Redemption. Most celebrated are Lorenzo Ghiberti's gilded bronze doors at the eastern entrance, the Porta del Paradiso (Gate of Paradise). What you see today are copies – the originals are in the Museo dell’Opera del Duomo. Buy tickets online or at the ticket office at Piazza di San Giovanni 7, opposite the main Baptistry entrance.

Andrea Pisano executed the southern doors (1330), illustrating the life of St John the Baptist, and Lorenzo Ghiberti won a public competition in 1401 to design the northern doors, likewise replaced by copies today. Dante counts among the famous dunked in the Baptistry's baptismal font – still used each third Sunday of the month to baptise babies born within the surrounding San Lorenzo parish.


Lonely Planet's must-see attractions

Nearby Duomo & Piazza della Signoria attractions

1. Campanile

0.04 MILES

The 414-step climb up the cathedral's 85m-tall campanile, begun by Giotto in 1334, rewards with staggering city views. The first tier of bas-reliefs…

2. Cripta Santa Reparata

0.05 MILES

Inside the duomo a stairway near the main entrance in the nave leads down to the gift shop and crypt where excavations between 1965 and 1974 unearthed…

3. Cupola del Brunelleschi

0.08 MILES

A Renaissance masterpiece, the duomo's cupola – 91m high and 45.5m wide – was built between 1420 and 1436. Filippo Brunelleschi, taking inspiration from…

4. Duomo

0.1 MILES

Florence's duomo is the city's most iconic landmark. Capped by Filippo Brunelleschi's red-tiled cupola, it's a staggering construction whose breathtaking…

5. Museo di Casa Martelli

0.11 MILES

A mooch around this frescoed Renaissance palazzo is tantamount to a fascinating peek behind of the scenes of a noble family of 18th-century bankers,…

6. Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana

0.11 MILES

Beyond the Basilica di San Lorenzo ticket office lie peaceful cloisters framing a garden with orange trees. Stairs lead up the loggia to the Biblioteca…

7. Piazza della Repubblica

0.12 MILES

The site of a Roman forum and heart of medieval Florence, this busy civic space was created in the 1880s as part of a controversial plan of 'civic…

8. Basilica di San Lorenzo

0.13 MILES

Considered one of Florence's most harmonious examples of Renaissance architecture, this unfinished basilica was the Medici parish church and mausoleum. It…