Arnolfo di Cambio designs Florence Cathedral

1292

The Tuscan city commissioned Arnolfo di Cambio to plan a new cathedral, the Duomo di Santa Maria del Fiore, whose scale would humble all existing Italian churches. Construction began in 1296. The dome would wait for Brunelleschi, but the ambition was there from the first stone. Arnolfo's original facade was later demolished, and the current marble exterior was not completed until the nineteenth century.