★★★★★ 5.0
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Galleria Spada
Right now, tourists are walking past that sculpture in the courtyard thinking it's life-sized... but it's only sixty centimeters tall. Welcome to Borromini's most devious trick at Galleria Spada on Piazza Capo di Ferro, just steps from Campo de' Fiori. The stucco-covered facade you're looking at went up in 1548 for Cardinal Capodiferro, covered in Roman emperors and heroes. But the real mind-bender is inside. In 1653, Borromini and a mathematician created that colonnade in the Secret Garden that appears thirty-seven meters long. Walk closer... it's EIGHT meters. The columns shrink, the floor rises, and suddenly your brain can't be trusted. Upstairs, four rooms preserve Cardinal Bernardino Spada's original seventeenth-century arrangement, paintings stacked multiple levels high just like nobles displayed them. Artemisia Gentileschi, Titian, Caravaggio... all squeezed together in this intimate palazzo that somehow survived as a time capsule while the rest became government offices for Italy's State Council.
Did You Know?
- The Galleria Spada is home to one of the most famous optical illusions in architecture: Francesco Borromini’s forced perspective gallery in the palace courtyard. At first glance, the colonnaded corridor appears to be about 37 meters long with a life-sized statue at the end, but in reality, it is only 8 meters long and the statue is just 60 centimeters tall—a brilliant Baroque trick that continues to astonish visitors of all ages.
- The art collection was assembled largely by Cardinal Bernardino Spada and his brother Virgilio in the 17th century, featuring masterpieces by Guido Reni, Titian, Guercino, Rubens, Caravaggio, and Artemisia Gentileschi. After being scattered during World War II, the collection was painstakingly reassembled to recreate the original 16th–17th century gallery layout, complete with period furniture and sculptures—making it a rare, immersive glimpse into noble Roman life of the era.
- Palazzo Spada’s façade is a Renaissance masterpiece, adorned with intricate stucco work and statues of Rome’s ‘Illustrious Men’ like Romulus, Caesar, and Trajan. A hidden detail is the Spada family coat of arms, which disrupts a sequence of medallions and features a dog at the base of a flaming column with the motto ‘utroque temporum’ (at all times), symbolizing steadfast devotion—a fun visual puzzle for families to spot during their visit.