GIULIANO da MAIANO. – Architect and woodcarver, born in Maiano (Fiesole) in 1432, died in Naples on 17 October 1490. He belonged to a family of artists: his father, Leonardo d’Antonio, was a stonecutter, Benedetto (v.) and Giovanni were sculptors.
In his youth he took up the art of woodcarving, and his most important work in this field is the beautiful cabinetry of the new sacristy of S. Maria del Fiore (1463). But he had already begun working as an architect, submitting a design for the oratory of the Madonna della Tavola in Orvieto Cathedral (not carried out), and completing the Palazzo Strozzino in Florence, begun by Michelozzo. His subsequent activity took place largely away from Florence, almost always with his brothers as collaborators: between 1466 and 1468, in S. Gimignano, he provided the design for the transformation of the Collegiate Church, and together with Benedetto he completed the chapel of S. Fina; in 1473 he was in Siena (Palazzo Spannocchi); in 1474 he began the construction of the Cathedral of Faenza (completed by Lapo di Pagno Portigiani), inspired by the Brunelleschian model of S. Lorenzo; in 1481–85, summoned by Girolamo Basso della Rovere, he directed the construction of the basilica of Loreto. His ties with Florence, where in 1477 he was master builder of the Opera del Duomo, weakened when, in 1485, summoned by Ferdinando d’Aragona, he went to Naples, where he remained until his death. Following the destruction of the Villa di Poggio Reale, his only surviving work in Naples is the imposing Porta Capuana. G. was the principal disseminator of Brunelleschian forms in the Marches, Emilia, and Campania. It is uncertain whether he also worked in Rome, where Vasari attributes to him works of exceptional importance,
such as the construction of part of the Palazzo Venezia and the Loggia della benedizione in S. Pietro.