Sometimes the Vatican Museums of Rome conceal real and unique architectural treasures, such as the so-called Scalone del Bramante. Usually closed to the public, because it can be visited by specific reservation, this architectural element is capable of representing in all respects the life that took place in what once was the building that housed the papal apartments. Even for a tour guide like me is a special time when I walk here with my tourists, also because I can try an unusual perspective for a city view.

A helical staircase conceived and designed by Bramante, the famous architect who for years worked in the Vatican area and for the popes, starting the works that will forever change the history of art! This staircase will also be used as a model by other famous architects who copied the structure, such as Borromini for example. Everything arises from a need, when on the top of the Vatican Hill stood the villa of Innocent VIII, pontiff of the end of the 15th century, with gardens that sloped down following the slope of the hill. Giulio II Della Rovere, and to know more about his profile click here, the famous pontiff who always thought big, wanted to deeply modify the entire architectural layout of the area, having his private apartments built and adding courtyards and galleries. For this daring project, Donato Bramante himself was called, who had already proved himself in other realities. The problem was only one: how to connect the different environments (including galleries, rooms and courtyards) on the numerous levels that the hill opposed. One of the greatest geniuses of the Renaissance, that Bramante who better than others from an architectural point of view combining the new solutions of his era with the antecedent ones coming from classical culture, created a series of rooms and buildings that slope down and over floors, in a complex work from an architectural and design point of view.

And this staircase is a testimony to it! Here, then, is a daring helical staircase, which rises for meters and meters with elegance and rigor. The columns that follow one another, one after the other, almost accompany the sinuous movement of the staircase. It was also designed to have a sort of panoramic function, with its windows, as well as a service staircase. It even seems that even wagons could pass through here. And still today millions of people a year pass through those same courtyards (like that of the Belvedere where there is also a secret...), wanted and designed by Bramante.