Casa Romei was built by the merchant Giovanni Romei around the mid-15th century, enlarged on the occasion of his marriage to Polissena d’Este. The two late Gothic courtyards, the flowering decorations running along the walls of the noble floor loggias, the frescoes of the Room of the Sibyls and Prophets, the “Studiolo” and the late 15th-century painted partitions of Giovanni Romei’s apartment constitute a unique artistic corpus in Ferrara. The rooms on the first floor were adorned during the 16th century with grotesque decorations. The Hall of Honor bears the emblems of Ippolito II d’Este, when the house was part of the Corpus Domini convent complex. After the suppression of the convent, it was acquired by the State property in 1898. After a period of abandonment and significant restorations, Casa Romei became a museum in 1953, housing collections of frescoes detached from various suppressed churches in Ferrara such as Sant’Andrea and Santa Caterina Martire, as well as statues, tombstones, and other architectural decorations from city buildings.
