![\"Dome-300\"](\"https:\/\/magazine.owen.vanderbilt.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/legacy\/2012\/05\/Dome-300.jpg\" "\\"Dome-300\\"")
In this age of technological\u00a0wonders, it\u2019s easy to forget that ours is just the latest in a long line of innovative periods through history. For every new marvel to come along, there\u2019s likely an equally striking precedent in the past. Perhaps no period demonstrates this better than the Renaissance, whose luminaries upended the medieval ideas of their day and spanned\u00a0the gap to our own modern times.<\/p>\n
Of all the monuments to Renaissance ingenuity, one in particular has held my interest ever since I saw it in person years ago. The Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore in Florence, Italy, otherwise known as the Duomo, is a towering achievement in architecture. Its octagonal dome, which is 140 feet wide and more than twice as high, remains the largest one ever built with bricks and mortar\u2014no small feat considering it was completed nearly 600 years ago.<\/p>\n
As awe-inspiring as the cathedral is to behold, the story behind its construction is just as remarkable. Legend has it that architect Filippo Brunelleschi received the commission to build the dome by winning a competition to see who could successfully stand an egg upright. While others tried to balance their eggs in vain, Brunelleschi smashed his on end. This act of bravado foreshadowed the daring design to come.<\/p>\n
Whether the story\u2019s apocryphal or not, there\u2019s no doubt Brunelleschi was a man of rare talent. Yet often overlooked is the fact that he already had a foundation to build upon. Brunelleschi\u2019s breakthrough was the culmination of a process that had begun more than a century earlier with architect Arnolfo di Cambio, who called for a dome of similar scope in his drawings. No one at that time knew how to construct such a dome, but that did not deter di Cambio or the builders who followed him. For decades they continued laying the groundwork, confident that someone would eventually finish what they had started.<\/p>\n
That to me is the most inspirational part of the story. For all the originality of Brunelleschi\u2019s dome, it could not have happened without the vision of those who came before him. As di Cambio showed, innovation is as much about planning as it is flashes of brilliance.<\/p>\n