The Florence State Archives are hosting the documentary exhibition Meccanica e ornato. A codex from the Buontalenti school. The Secco Suardo manuscript from 21 March to 23 May 2025.
Following the acquisition of the Quaderno di meccanica e ornato attributed to the school of Bernardo Buontalenti and known as Taccuino Secco Suardo by the Ministry of Culture in 2018, the State Archives of Florence, in collaboration with the Museo Galileo and the Biblioteca Marucelliana, are presenting this important document to the Florentine public for the first time.
The documentary exhibition, the first of a series of initiatives that will be dedicated to the work, consists of the display of the codex accompanied by a large multimedia totem that allows visitors to virtually ‘browse’ through its maps. The document will be opened on a never-before-seen perspective scenography depicting the city of Florence and showing many similarities with the hitherto lost scenography with which Buontalenti inaugurated the first version of the Uffizi's Teatro Mediceo in 1586, immediately highlighting the importance and relevance of the Codex for the history of theatre and entertainment.
The other sections of the exhibition, enriched by documents from the State Archives, the National Central Library, the Marucelliana Library and the Museo Galileo, follow the topics covered by the Codex: geometry, mechanics, architecture and engineering, stage machinery and theatrical costumes. The works on display, flanked by images of the document that run along the walls, take the visitor on an exciting journey through the extraordinary skills of an architect between the 16th and 17th centuries, highlighting the intertwining of interests and knowledge at the basis of his training at the time.
