Ressource : ‘Hidden Florence’ App: Free Resource for Teachers and Students

Hidden Florence’ smartphone app is a major digital public history project designed for students and teachers, as well as for a general public; it can be used on-site as a geolocated walking app, or remotely.

‘Hidden Florence’, first launched in 2014, is centred on character-led walks using the 1584 Bonsignori map of Florence. From one prototype character, there are now five, spanning the 1450s to 1560s. There are three men and two women, rich and poor, including Cosimo (il vecchio) de’ Medici (1459) and Niccolosa Alessandri (1492). Through these characters the app explores the dynamic relationship between place and identity in the early modern city, and a wide range of topics in Renaissance Italian social and cultural history.

In collaboration with the National Gallery in London, the new app will also link to an AR (augmented reality) project, to be launched later this summer. This element revolves around the destroyed church of San Pier Maggiore. In Florence, the AR will ‘build’ the church around its remains on site. In the National Gallery, it will ‘build’ the church around its main Iacopo di Cione altarpiece, held by the gallery.

‘Hidden Florence’ is a collaboration between the universities of Exeter, Cambridge and Toronto, and is primarily funded by the AHRC (UK). It is free to download and use.

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