All’antica life style: private thermae in Italian Renaissance architecture

The heritage of antiquity was the basis of Italian Renaissance architecture and inexhaustible source of inspiration for its masters. Among the facilities of par - ticular interest for architects and lovers of the epoch were the Roman thermae. Their parts and elements brought to life a variety of spatial solutions in architecture of tem - ples, villas and cathedrals. However the attempts to lit - erally build the thermae similar to Roman ones in time of Renessaince were rare to encounter. The most detailed description of Renessaince ther - mae was given by Giorgio Vasari in the life story “ On Le - one Leoni Aretino and other sculptors and architects” which involves the brief biography of Galeazzo Aless - si. It narrates, among others, about the thermae built by Galeazzo Alesssi on Grimaldi (later Sauli) villa in Bisagno nearby Genova (the building was not saved). According to Vasari, the thermae were octagonally planned pavilion with the round pool in its centre. The interior was worked in antique style. The article gives an insight into efforts to build the private thermae during Renaissance, prior to Villa Grimaldi’s pavilion, which testifies to customers’ looking to reconstruct all’antica lifestyle in private life particularly on the villa which, following an - cient men of latters was regarded as ‘temple of muses’.