Who is Andrea Palladio?
Pietro della Gondola and Marta called “the zota”’s son, was born in Padova (Padua) the 30th November 1508. Of humble origins, he began his career as simple stone-cutter, in Bartolomeo Cavazza from Sossano’s shop; he escaped from that place in 1524 because of the hard working conditions and went to Vicenza, where entered in Giovanni di Giacomo from Porlezza and Girolamo Pittoni from Lumignano’s shop. Even if he did not received a regular education, he was helped in his studies by the humanist Gian Giorgio Trissino, known between 1535 and 1538 while he was working in the Villa of Cricoli’s construction site: it will be just the humanist-recognizing the artist’s extraordinary gifts- to give him the classical name of Palladio (from Atena Pallade Atena), and later on lead him to Rome, where he could dedicate himself to the study of the monuments of the antiquity and Bramante and Buonarroti’s architecture. His first drawings of small town-houses are approximately of the year 1540 (Villa Godi
Andrea Palladio (1508-1580) was a Renaissance Italian architect who is today considered one of the most influential architects in the western world. Born Andrea di Pietro della Gondola in Padua, Italy, Palladio was something of a child prodigy. At the age of 13 he fled Padua and his apprenticeship as a stonecutter to move to Vicenza, where he was known to frequent the studio of Bartolemo Cavazza and from whom he learned the basics of the stonemasonry trade. However, for all his early promise, it wasn’t until his thirties that Palladio became the architect we know today, designing some of Italy’s most noteworthy and refined buildings. Andrea Palladio really rose to architectural prominence when he received the patronage of the renowned humanist poet Giorgio Trissino. From Trissino Palladio received money and his fanciful moniker, taken from Pallas Athena, Greek goddess of wisdom. In 1549, he returned from a tour of classical Italy and began work on the basilica of his native Padua; the
