The Design

Michelangelo's original painting is designed to reflect the barrel vaulting of the ceiling and minor cross vaulting above the side windows. Michelangelo emphasizes the of the ceiling architecture to create triangular frames running either side of the ceiling, these frames are made into shallow niches, each providing a enclosure for major Biblical figures. Building on these triangular enclosures, Michelangelo divides the main expanse of the ceiling with classical columns and caryatids.

The ceiling of the room in the villa is a rather more prosaic rectangle with no architectural structure to provide a similar starting point, however the current idea is to use the same concept, that of architectural elements to divide the space for each of our heroes. Where Michelangelo looked to classical architecture to create his ground, on the basis presumably that the recently rediscovered classicism was held in high regard as the work of ancient masters and represented an ideal vision of antiquity, the new ceiling will use a more modern architectural style.

Currently there are two possible designs for the ceiling layout, firstly mimicking the triangular device used by Michelangelo the new ceiling would be divided using the geodesic architecture of Buckminster Fuller and latterly Norman Foster in the British Museum central court and Nicholas Grimshaw's Eden project. The other possibility is to use the architecture of Joseph Paxton's Crystal Palace and Glass House at Chatsworth and Decimus Burton's design for the Palm House at Kew Gardens. This latter style has the advantage of containing some of the features of classical architecture and therefore redolent of the original ceiling.