Palazzo Zuccari

The Palazzo Zuccari, in Rome

The Palazzo Zuccari is a strange residence of Rome, famous for its door and its windows in the form of monster mouths. The Rome audio-guided tour stops here to evoke this singular building, a fantasy of a Renaissance painter, near the Piazza di Spagna.

The house of monsters of the painter Zuccari

If you make here a slight detour, it is to discover the strange Palazzo Zuccari, which surprises all those who pass in front of it. This building owes its singularity to its extravagant decor: its entrance door and some of its windows are sculpted in the form of mouths of grimacing monsters, that you cross as if you penetrated the mouth of a fantastic creature. This to say the least unusual fantasy is the work of Federico Zuccari, painter and architect of the end of the Renaissance, who had this residence built at the end of the sixteenth century to install there his dwelling and his artist's studio. These stone monsters, inspired by the grotesques and the taste for mannerism and the fantastic of the era, were to both astonish and testify to the overflowing imagination of their creator. Over the centuries, the palace welcomed illustrious guests and today shelters an institution dedicated to the history of art. An architectural curiosity and a painter's fantasy, the Palazzo Zuccari is an astonishing stop of the discovery of Rome.

What to see

Here you discover the strange residence whose entrance door and some windows are sculpted in the form of mouths of grimacing monsters, a fantasy of the painter and architect Federico Zuccari who had it built at the end of the sixteenth century for his dwelling and his studio, inspired by the grotesques and mannerism, today sheltering an institution of the history of art, near the Piazza di Spagna. The Palazzo Zuccari is a curiosity of Rome. It is an astonishing stop, to be explored on foot.

Practical information

The Palazzo Zuccari lies near the Piazza di Spagna, at the top of the Pincio hill, in Rome, reachable on foot. You admire its façade and its stone monsters from the street; it shelters an institution whose access follows its own conditions. You discover it during a walk in the quarter.

What is particular about the Palazzo Zuccari in Rome?

Its entrance door and some of its windows are sculpted in the form of mouths of grimacing monsters; this fantasy is the work of the painter and architect Federico Zuccari, who had this residence built at the end of the sixteenth century for his dwelling and his studio, inspired by the grotesques and mannerism.

Where is the Palazzo Zuccari in Rome?

Near the Piazza di Spagna, at the top of the Pincio hill, in Rome, in Italy.