Villa Farnesina

The most exquisite small Renaissance palace in Rome — a 1506–1511 villa built for the fabulously wealthy Sienese banker Agostino Chigi by Baldassare Peruzzi, every room of which is covered in remarkable frescoes. The ground floor Loggia of Galatea holds Raphael's magnificent fresco of the sea-nymph Galatea (1512) — one of his masterworks — alongside Sebastiano del Piombo's Polyphemus and Peruzzi's spectacular illusionistic ceiling of Agostino's horoscope. The adjacent Loggia of Amor and Psyche was also painted by Raphael and his workshop. Upstairs, Peruzzi's Sala delle Prospettive uses trompe-l'oeil architecture to dissolve the walls into a panoramic view of 16th-century Rome — the greatest painted illusionistic space of its era. Consistently featured by Lonely Planet, rome.net, romeing.it, and The Culture Trip as one of Rome's most underrated museums. Located in Trastevere, accessible without a queue — just buy a ticket at the door.