Uffizi to Undergo €50 Million Renovation Across All Three Florence Sites
The Uffizi in Florence has announced a €50 million ($58 million) renovation that will touch nearly every corner of its museum complex over the next two years, from the main gallery halls to the Palazzo Pitti and the Boboli Gardens Artnet News.
Director Simone Verde unveiled the plans at a press conference on 5 August. The driving forces are rising visitor numbers and ageing climate-control systems — the museum welcomed about 5.3 million people across its three sites in 2025, making it the second-most visited museum in Italy.
The project's most visible change will be at the front door. The visitor entrance is being relocated to the right side of the main facade, separating entry and exit flows to move crowds through security more efficiently — a long-needed fix for a building that was never designed for modern footfall Uffizi official site. A new reception and screening area will accompany the shift, along with an exhibition space dedicated to the history of the Uffizi's collection.
Inside the galleries, the renovation reaches deep. A new gallery will be devoted to Andrea del Castagno's Portraits of Illustrious Men and Women, a 15th-century fresco series — a significant rehang that gives the work its own dedicated room. The Flemish galleries are being completely reinstalled with new lighting and exhibition layouts, as part of broader upgrades to lighting, climate control and accessibility across the complex The Florentine.
A €12 million ($13.8 million) chunk of the budget will go toward restoring the Uffizi's exterior and roofs, plus installing new climate-control systems to protect the collection from Florence's summer heat and humidity.
Across the River Arno at the Palazzo Pitti, the museum's second major site, the work is just as extensive. The Treasury of the Grand Dukes — the former Medici summer apartments on the ground and mezzanine floors — will be refurbished. The Palatine Gallery, which holds the Medici family's Renaissance and Baroque paintings, is also set for restoration. And a new exhibition space will open on the Palazzo Pitti's top floor, bringing previously unused areas into public use.
Outdoors, the renovation will return the Cortile dell'Ammannati courtyard to the public "in its full aesthetic and monumental integrity," according to the Uffizi's own announcement — a phrase that signals the removal of later additions and partitions accumulated over decades.
The announcement builds on momentum from June, when the Uffizi reopened its Botticelli rooms. There, Primavera (1480) and The Birth of Venus (1485) now face each other inside state-of-the-art display cases — a preview of the kind of upgraded presentation the wider renovation aims to deliver.
For a museum that draws visitors in the millions, two years of scaffolding and temporary closures is a trade-off. The promise is a Uffizi that handles its crowds better, keeps its art safer, and opens rooms that have sat behind closed doors.
