Vignola, Giacomo or Jacopo Barozzi da Vignola (1507–73). Born in Vignola, near Modena, he became the most important architect working in Rome immediately after the death of Michelangelo. With Ammannati, Michelangelo (as consultant), and Vasari he designed (for Pope Julius III (1550–5)) the Villa Giulia, Rome (1551–5), one of the great works of Mannerism in which villa, terraces, hemicycles, and gardens were composed as a whole. It was intended as an elegant retreat for the Pope, the hemicycle clearly intended to be a reflection of Bramante's Belvedere Court in the Vatican (begun 1505). Around the same time he built the Church of Sant'Andrea, Via Flaminia, Rome (1550–4), the earliest example of the use of an elliptical drum and dome set on a rectangular base: the building's external appearance was derived from Roman tombs and the Pantheon, while the body of the church had an applied temple-front of pilasters carrying a pediment. His later Church of Sant'Anna dei Palafrenieri, Vatican, Rome (begun 1572), has an elliptical plan with a dome over it. Both buildings were influential on architects of the Baroque period, for the ellipse was to become a favoured device, especially in Rome and Central Europe.

In 1559 Vignola was appointed by Cardinal Alessandro Farnese (1520–89) as Architect of the Palazzo Farnese at Caprarola, near Rome, already begun on a pentagonal plan to designs (1520s) by Peruzzi and Sangallo the Younger for Pope Paul III (1534–49). It has a circular cortile in which rustication and overlapping triumphal arches feature, and an ingenious, very beautiful spiral staircase with Tuscan columns and a winding Roman Doric string. With its ramps, huge flights of external stairs, and formal gardens, it is one of the most majestic ensembles of C16, brilliantly connected to the adjoining village. The building's great cornice, with its plain vertical consoles, was widely copied, notably in C19. Vignola designed the Mother Church of the Jesuits in Rome, II Gesù, begun in 1568 (also for Cardinal Farnese). The plan has similarities to that of Alberti's Sant'Andrea, Mantua, with a tall, tunnel-vaulted nave, a series of chapels instead of aisles, and a façade (begun 1571 by della Porta) consisting of two storeys of Orders of pilasters and columns, with the buttresses hidden behind scrolls, a device used earlier at Alberti's Church of Santa Maria Novella, Florence. The Baroque decorations of the interior were added in 1668–73. Churches derived from the exemplar of Il Gesù were built all over Roman Catholic Europe and Latin America, so the Roman church was Vignola's most influential building. His Facciata dei Banchi, Piazza Maggiore, Bologna (c.1561–5), was his most important contribution to urban design.

Vignola was Architect to the Basilica of San Pietro, Rome (1567–73), where he carried on Michelangelo's designs. He wrote La Regola delli Cinque Ordini d'Architettura (The Rule for the Five Orders of Architecture—1562) in which (clearly influenced by Serlio) he established paradigms of the Orders based on Antique examples, with clear guidance for setting them out based on a simple modular system. It was an enormously useful and influential book, especially in France, and appeared in many editions and in several countries. He also wrote Le Due Regole della Prospettiva Pratica (The Two Rules for Practical Perspective), published 1583.

Bibliography

Coolidge et al. (1974);
E. Harris (1990);
Heydenreich (1996);
Lazzaro (1990);
Lotz (1977);
P. Murray (1969, 1986);
Orazi (1982);
Placzek (ed.) (1982);
Patetta (ed.) (1990);
J. Jodidio (1996);
Heydenreich (1996);
Tuttle et al. (2002);
Vignola (1596);
Walcher Casotti (1960);
D. Watkin (1986)