The Hall of Raphael Frescoes Where the Pope Lives at the Vatican Is Getting a Much-Needed Restoration With the Help of Lasers

Conservators will spend the next five years cleaning and retouching the Renaissance frescoes, which date back to the early 16th century

Sonja Anderson | Daily Correspondent

June 30, 2026 9:31 a.m.

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After 500 years of wear and tear, the Vatican’s grand corridor of Raphael frescoes is about to be cleaned and restored. The Raphael Loggia is a roughly 200-foot-long hallway on the second floor of the Apostolic Palace—the pope’s official residence. Its walls are covered in colorful, Biblical frescoes painted by students of the Renaissance master.

“The Loggias represent a revival of the style and techniques of antiquity,” Barbara Jatta, director of the Vatican Museums, tells the Art Newspaper’s James Imam. “They were the destination of choice for generations of clergymen, diplomats, but above all Grand Tourists and artists who came specifically to draw inspiration from antiquity.”

According to a statement, the multimillion-dollar restoration project is sponsored by the World Monuments Fund and the Stephen A. Schwarzman Foundation. It’s expected to take about five years and involve a team of more than 20 restoration experts. The project marks the frescoes’ first major restoration, reports Nicole Winfield for the Associated Press.

Raphael, born in Urbino, Italy, in 1483, was one of the High Renaissance’s key artists and architects. Pope Julius II commissioned him to decorate the Vatican palace’s papal apartment—resulting in the artist’s famous painting School of Athens. Later, Pope Leo X brought Raphael back to the Vatican to decorate one of the Apolistic Palace’s loggias, the halls overlooking its courtyard.

By that time, Raphael had a team of assistant artists at his disposal. While the master designed the loggia frescoes, they were actually executed by Giulio Romano, Giovanni da Udine and Perin del Vaga, between 1517 and 1519, per the statement. The 13-foot-wide corridor is divided into 13 bays, each decorated with about four paintings of Biblical episodes. While the first 12 bays depict Old Testament stories, the 13th is from the New Testament. These scenes are accompanied by painted and stuccoed botanical designs and grotesques.

The decorated hall was “immediately considered one of the highest expressions of Renaissance art applied to architecture,” per the statement. “It is still today one of the most refined testimonies of the figurative language of the early 16th century.”

In 1813, sculptor Antonio Canova directed the corridors be enclosed with windows, which prevented adequate air circulation, trapping moisture in the halls. Throughout the centuries, the environment degraded Raphael’s students’ work. Early conservators tried to glue flaking paint onto the wall, which only made things worse.

“These adhesives shrink and peel off the paint,” Angela Cerreta, the Vatican Museums’ deputy head restorer for paintings and wooden materials, tells the Art Newspaper. “If you don’t remove these adhesives and protective films, they’ll keep stripping the color.”

To restore the walls of Raphael’s loggia to their former glory, technicians will adopt a “dry cleaning method,” says Paolo Violini, chief restorer at the Vatican Museums’ painting and wood materials restoration laboratory, in the statement. Violini says that because the paints are water-soluble, using traditional cleaning methods—like chemical solvents—would only deteriorate them further, reports the AP. Instead, the conservators will clean the frescoes with lasers.

The restoration will also include the installation of special windows, which will create a stable climate in the corridor.

“The new windows are absolutely essential,” Jatta tells the Art Newspaper. “If the right microclimatic conditions aren’t created in that space, there’s no point in carrying out the restoration, as those areas and the frescoes would certainly deteriorate again.”

The upper floors of the Apostolic Palace are now home to Pope Leo XIV. But during the reign of his predecessor, Pope Francis, the building was famously unoccupied. The late pope chose to reside in the Vatican guesthouse, instead. He said of the palace, “It is big and spacious, but the entrance is really tight. People can come only in dribs and drabs, and I cannot live without people. I need to live my life with others.”

As the Raphael Loggia is located in the pope’s private residence, it is not open to the public. The Stephen A. Schwarzman Foundation will give additional funds to digitize images of the loggia so more people can appreciate the art, per the AP.

Sonja Anderson | Read More

Sonja Anderson is a daily correspondent for Smithsonian magazine who covers art, archaeology and culture, from newly discovered artifacts to the latest art heists.