Palazzo Contarini del Bovolo: External staircase

The mainly Gothic Palazzo Contarini Minelli dal Bovolo is well known for the winding-stairs, the Scala del Bovolo. The palace was built from 1499 on by Giovanni Candi. Its name is derived from the Venetian word for a snail-shell, bovolo. Even the branch of the Contarini that inhabited the palace was named after that singular architectural solution. According to stylistic relationships with the capitals of San Salvatore, the recent scholarship assumes that not Candi, but Giorgio Spavento was the architect of the stairway. The stairway tower is a fully Renaissance work.