Explore Brescia

Piazza della Loggia is a Renaissance square in Brescia laid out from 1433 under Venetian rule. It is framed by the Palazzo della Loggia, the old and new Monte di Pietà with Roman inscriptions set into their walls, and arcades below a clock tower with a 16th-century astronomical clock. A memorial recalls the bombing of 28 May 1974.

The Palazzo della Loggia is Brescia's town hall, a Renaissance palace on the west side of Piazza della Loggia. Begun in 1492 and completed in 1574 after interruptions, with designs attributed in part to Jacopo Sansovino and Andrea Palladio, it has an open arcaded loggia on the ground floor, an upper storey in white Botticino marble and a large lead-covered roof.

The New Cathedral is Brescia's main church, built from 1604 to 1825 on the site of the early Christian basilica of San Pietro de Dom, beside the round Old Cathedral. Its dome by Luigi Cagnola rises about 80 metres and was rebuilt after damage in the Second World War; inside are paintings by Romanino and Moretto and a monument to Pope Paul VI.

The Old Cathedral, known as La Rotonda, is a circular Romanesque church in Brescia begun around 1100 on the site of an earlier basilica, and the city's winter co-cathedral. It keeps the crypt of San Filastrio, the red marble sarcophagus of Bishop Berardo Maggi from 1308 and paintings by Moretto and Romanino.