Disabled
Ex-Servicemen's Home
Via del Castellaccio 15/Piazza Brunelleschi
The completed complex, ASCFi.
The National Association of Disabled Ex-Servicemen and War Invalids bought a part of the former Camaldolese monastery of Santa Maria degli Angeli and the ruins of Brunelleschi's Rotunda (one of the great architect's last works, which he never completed and which was reduced to the state of a roofless ruin known locally as "Il Castellaccio") as offices and reception rooms in 1932.
The new building, tacked onto the monastery, was built in neo-Renaissance style by architect Rodolfo Sabatini between 1934 and 1937. At the same time, Alessandro Giuntoli restored the Rotunda in neo-Brunelleschian style. The king officially opened the complex on 4 November 1937. With the drop in the numbers of wounded veterans after World War II, the building became too large for the association's requirements. Today the Rotunda houses Florence University's Language Centre, while some of the offices are occupied by the ASL or local health authority.
From the top: The cloister of the former monastery of Santa Maria degli Angeli in 1935; Internal view of Brunelleschi's Rotunda in 1935, ASCFi, Firenze, 1935, 4, p. 98.
"Prospect" of the Disabled Ex-Servicemen's Home and Brunelleschi's Rotunda by architect Rodolfo Sabatini, ASCFi, Firenze, 1935, 4, p. 97.
The complex under construction, ASCFi, Firenze, 1935, 4, p. 100.
