In one of my last posts, I shared 2 miniature paintings of mosaic floors that had captured my heart in Venice. Well that wasn’t the end of my preoccupation with painting the wonderful designs I saw on my last trip to Italy.

Another floor that stopped me in my tracks was in the Piccolomini Library attached to Siena’s Duomo. Usually this is a room where most people enter and gasp when they look up and they remain eyes up. Why? Because this is what it looks like:

The painted frescos by Pinturicchio on the walls and ceiling are mind-blowing. So colourful and detailed! And like everyone else, I looked up too. On the way out though, I just happened to look down to see this extraordinary floor and stopped to examine it more closely, taking in the navy diagonal tiles with golden crescent moons and braids. Well-worn but laid out in such an interesting intricate interlocking pattern.

As I stopped to admire it, I had suddenly created a traffic jam on the way out of the door and got bumped by a woman behind me. She too looked down, thinking I had probably dropped something. Soon we were both taking photos of the floor and nodding at each other in appreciation, happily holding up traffic. (Love those shared awe moments!)

When I started to prepare my miniature painting version of this Renaissance floor, I did a bit of research to find out that the tiles were also designed by the artist Pinturicchio, incorporating the crescent moon family emblem of his patron, the Piccolomini family. Smart! He knew who was paying the decorating bills!

One other place where I spent some time caught up in some early Renaissance interior design was in Florence’s Palazzo Davanzati – a preserved 14th-century noble residence open to visitors. While the floors weren’t so interesting, the wall designs were a marvel. Many rooms in this palace are decorated with the predecessor to patterned wallpaper – hand-painted patterns. Hand-painted!!

This type of decoration was considered the height of opulence in its day – expensive and very time-consuming. Can you imagine someone painting each and every part of a wallpaper design in a huge room of your house? Here’s one room that I found whimsical but also astounding:

The green and orange wall pattern is what I chose to paint in a 2.5″-square miniature because it made me smile because… you know… parrots!

These design-themed miniatures were a fun departure for me. I also find it interesting that I painted them both while we were preparing our home for sale. Guess I had decorating on the brain!

Each original comes in an 8″-square mat and are available to purchase here