Florence, 13-year-old on vacation damages exterior of Orsanmichele church

It will cost the Florentine vacation dearly to the family of a 13-year-old boy who damaged the exterior of the Orsanmichele church. The young boy, visiting Florence with his family, climbed over the building’s outer fence and grabbed onto the frame of Giambologna’s copy of Saint Luke, one of the statues decorating the church’s niches (the original is kept inside, in the Orsanmichele Museum). With his weight, the 13-year-old caused the detachment of some fragments of the frame, two about ten centimeters wide and a third of twenty-five, which, however, in contrast to the other two, suffered only partial detachment.

The scene was captured by surveillance cameras in the area: the little family then walked away from the area, but some passersby who witnessed the scene alerted a patrol of policemen who stopped them for identification. The child, given his age, is not chargeable, and his parents will be held accountable for his actions: the vigilantes fined them 160 euros, and it is highly likely that they will have to bear the cost of repairing the damage. The fragments have already been collected and handed over to the Superintendence for restoration.

Photo: exterior of the Orsanmichele church. Ph. Credit Greg Willis.

Florence, 13-year-old on vacation damages exterior of Orsanmichele church

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