The Gothic Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore, known as the Duomo, is in Florence, Italy.
Florence Cathedral was begun in 1296 on the site of the older church of Santa Reparata. Architect Arnolfo di Cambio designed the original Gothic plan, and later builders including Giotto and Francesco Talenti continued the ambitious project.
Its most famous feature is Filippo Brunelleschi’s enormous dome, completed in 1436. The dome’s construction solved a major engineering challenge without the traditional full wooden centering and helped make Florence a defining centre of the Renaissance.
The cathedral is often confused with nearby Giotto’s Campanile and the Baptistery of San Giovanni; all three stand in Florence’s Piazza del Duomo, but only Santa Maria del Fiore is the cathedral itself. Its western façade is also a later Gothic Revival reconstruction, completed in the 19th century.