The Golden Staircase
Jacopo Sansovino and Antonio Abbondi, called Scarpagnino; stuccoes by Alessandro Vittoria (Sansovino 1486 to 1570; Vittoria 1525 to 1608) · 1554 to 1559
After the open air of the courtyard and the loggia, this staircase pulls you into a golden tunnel. The barrel vault above your head is covered with white stucco figures and ornament set against a ground of gold leaf, with small painted scenes tucked between them. It was built in the middle of the sixteenth century to a design by Jacopo Sansovino and completed by Scarpagnino, and its purpose was simple: only the most important people were allowed to climb it. The name of every nobleman entitled to use the staircase was written in the Golden Book, the register of Venetian patrician families, and the gold above you echoes that book.
Look up as you climb. The stucco work is by Alessandro Vittoria, the finest sculptor in Venice after Sansovino, and the figures are crisp and lively, with allegories of the virtues that a ruler was expected to have. The frescoes between them were painted by Giovanni Battista Franco and show scenes drawn from mythology and history. Notice how the light from the windows on the landings catches the gilding and makes the whole vault seem to glow, an effect that would have been even stronger by torchlight. The steps themselves are of pale Istrian stone, deliberately plain so that all the richness stays overhead.
The staircase leads to the Doge's apartments and then on up to the institutional rooms where the councils met. Every ambassador, every magistrate and every new Doge passed this way, so it was designed as a first lesson in the wealth and dignity of the state. A detail worth catching is the small landing at the top, where the vault flattens and the decoration becomes densest, as if the palace were saving its most lavish gesture for the moment just before you enter the rooms of power.
Did You Know? The staircase shares its name with the Libro d'Oro, the Golden Book that listed the noble families entitled to sit in the Great Council.
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