In his biography, the great Michelangelo says that when he was an infant, he "took in the dust" of an old workshop where classical sculpture had been made for generations. This, he claimed, was how he inherited the sculptural greatness of his ancient Roman ancestors.  Of course, Michelangelo also had to work a little to become the greatest classical sculptor in history. He and his Italian Renaissance contemporaries studied the art and architecture of ancient Rome with unsurpassed interest. They maintained, restored, and even revived millennia-old classical designs. In the centuries that followed, artists and artisans in academies and workshops across Europe and America carried on the Renaissance tradition. Thanks to them, classical designs survive to the present day.

At Four Sams Concrete workshop in Scranton, PA, designs for benches, birdbaths, white concrete urns, the Virgin Mary, the Piet, and angels can be traced back to precedents from ancient Rome and the Italian Renaissance.

So, from Four Sams to you, "Venuto a Scranton, visiti la nostra officina, e respiri la polvere di Roma antica (Come to Scranton, visit our workshop, and breathe the dust of ancient Rome)."

Serlio's Architettura