ARCHITECTURE / FIRENZE SANTA MARIA NOVELLA 

Firenze Santa Maria Novella is the main railway station in Florence, and one of the busiest in Italy, with more than 59 million travellers passing through every year. 

The station is at the end of the high-speed railway line Direttissima, connecting Florence with Rome. 

It was inaugurated in 1848, initially to serve the railway to Pistoia and Pisa. 

Its first name was Maria Antonia (after Princess Maria Antonia of the Two Sicilies). 

After the unification of Italy, it was renamed after the nearby church, only a stone’s throw from the station. 

In the early 1930s, the construction of a new station building was planned. 

In several newspaper editorials, the plans were criticized, and soon they were altered. 

One of the leading critics was the influential Florentine sculptor Romano Romanellli, and based in his many arguments, a new design choice was made, presented by Gruppo Toscano.

The station was designed in 1932, and construction started already the same year, completed in 1934. 

The building is considered an excellent example of Italian modernism (but has little to do with the Italian Rationalism movement), influenced by Adolf Loos and Josef Hoffman. 

The station is symbolically important for Florence; it serves as the gateway to the city. The station is the first introduction that the visitor experiences. 

What makes the station architecturally outstanding is the perfect meeting between the sharp modernist lines and the soft colour of the “pietra forte”, a hard sandstone selected for the way it engages in dialogue with the façade of the church of Santa Maria Novella. 

Walking through the station is to experience the play between light and dark; daylight reaches the passenger concourse through a skylight without any supporting columns. 

This gives a sensation of openness and vast space. 

The station is completely different at night than during the day. 

Artificial lights illuminate the vast spaces. 

There are fewer visitors, and the soft lighting gives an elegant, almost refined, impression.