Santa Maria Maddalena dei Pazzi

One of the city’s least known churches, Santa Maria Maddalena was founded in the 13th century, then rebuilt in classical Renaissance style by Giuliano da Sangallo, then given the full Baroque whack when it was rededicated to the Counter-Reformation saint of the Pazzi family, who had lived as a cloistered nun in the previously incarnation of San Frediano in Cestello.

The Pazzi (their name does mean 'crazy' in Italian...) removed the churches original works by Botticelli, Perugino, Ghirlandaio and Lorenzo Credi and replaced them with theatrical schlock, with a gaudy trompe-l’oeil ceiling, paintings by Neapolitan Luca Giordano, florid chapels, and a wild marble chancel. One of the best paintings to survive in situ is Cosimo Rosselli's Coronation of the Virgin. Also seek out the Cappella del Giglio, frescoed in 1599 by Bernardino Poccetti, a work considered his masterpiece.