Although modest in size, the Scalone, or ‘Grand Staircase’, is characterised by its extraordinary decorative grandeur and consists of two parallel flights which, from the long landing, merge into a single flight leading to the Chapter House.
It was completely renovated and made more monumental than its original configuration after the Scuola acquired the pharmacy building. On that occasion, a third flight was added to the original two, and the landing was extended along the entire façade facing the church of the Carmini. The extension transformed the landing into a direct access point to the rooms of the Treasury and the Sacred Vestments (which is today an office), situated at either end and set at half-height above the ground floor. The design of the refurbishment is nowadays attributed to Baldassare Longhena, whilst the execution is considered the work of his pupil, Antonio Gaspari.
The barrel vaults of the stairway, along with the lowered curved spaces of the ceilings of the ground floor corridors and the landing, are entirely decorated with white and gold stucco work, realised by Alvise Bossi between 1728 and 1729. The relief frames, filled with cherubs, female and monstrous masks, mermaids, eagles and plant motifs, enclose gilded oval frames originally decorated with small frescoes. The entire pictorial scheme, comprising nine ovals and the ‘patches’ in the spaces between the white and gold stuccoes, was executed by Sante Piatti. Inside the ovals, only the figures of the Theological Virtues – Faith, Hope and Charity – remain today, arranged along the barrel vault of the second flight of stairs.
