Sollicciano Prison () is the main prison of Florence, Tuscany, Italy. It stands on the western outskirts of the city, on the border with Scandicci, and has been in use since 1983. Its plan is modelled on the lily that is the symbol of Florence.
The prison has been criticised for years over overcrowding and the state of its buildings. In June 2026 a Florence judge ordered the seizure of seven of its thirteen sections because of their hygiene and safety conditions.
History and design Sollicciano was built to replace the old prisons in the historic centre of Florence, among them the Murate. It was designed in 1973 by the architects Andrea Mariotti, Gilberto Campani, Piero Inghirami, Italo Castore, Pierluigi Rizzi and Enzo Camici, whose project had won a competition held that year. Construction lasted from 1976 to 1982. The design reflected the 1975 reform of the Italian prison system, which aimed to move away from detention based on isolation from society.
The semicircular accommodation blocks and the corridors that join them reproduce the shape of the Florentine lily. The plan follows the "telegraph pole" layout, in which a central spine links the different activities of the prison. The complex covers about 15 hectares, of which 2.5 are built on. Writing in 2024, the architect Francesco Gurrieri described the lily-shaped plan as a clear break with the panopticon, the 19th-century model of prison building. The complex is listed in the Ministry of Culture's census of Italian architecture built since 1945.
According to the Ministry of Justice, the original design had no bars on the cell windows. During construction General Carlo Alberto dalla Chiesa required some changes for security reasons, among them enclosed exercise yards and stronger balcony pillars. Building work ended in 1982 and the prison was handed over the following year.
Garden of Encounters The Giardino degli Incontri ("Garden of Encounters") is a pavilion with a garden and an open-air theatre inside the prison, where inmates meet their families and in particular their children. It was the last project of the architect Giovanni Michelucci. In a 1986 interview with Paese Sera he said that the idea had come from some inmates, who proposed designing a garden for the city inside the prison, and he called it one of the most beautiful and significant experiences of his life.
Michelucci died in 1990 and the work was completed after his death, with the final design drawn up by the Collegio degli ingegneri della Toscana together with the Michelucci Foundation. The garden was inaugurated on 26 June 2007.
Overcrowding and unrest In the months before July 2024 inmates had complained to prosecutors about bed bugs and the lack of water. On 4 July 2024 a 20-year-old inmate died by suicide in his cell, the 50th suicide in an Italian prison that year. His death set off a protest in which inmates set fire to mattresses. The water used by firefighters flooded entire sections, and about sixty inmates were moved to other prisons.
In January 2025, after another suicide in the prison on 3 January, the mayor of Florence Sara Funaro said that its conditions were inhuman and that the only solution was to demolish and rebuild it.
2026 seizure In June 2026 the preliminary investigation judge Alessandro Moneti, at the request of the Florence prosecutor's office, ordered the seizure of seven of the prison's thirteen sections. The order covered six sections of the judicial and penal wings together with the reception unit, about sixty cells in all, and required more than 200 inmates to be moved. The investigation was based on alleged breaches of the Italian law on health and safety at work, Legislative Decree 81/2008, applied to the prison as a workplace.
Alessio Scandurra of the prisoners' rights association Antigone described water infiltration throughout the prison and cells whose walls had turned black with mould. Tuscany's ombudsman for prisoners, Giuseppe Fanfani, said he could not remember a measure of this scale in fifty years. The justice minister Carlo Nordio told the Senate that the situation had built up over decades and that the prison would be reduced or emptied once places became available elsewhere, probably by the end of the year.
The Ministry of Justice appealed. On 11 July 2026 the review court in Florence upheld the seizure but annulled the part of the order that set deadlines for the transfers, leaving those decisions to the prison administration.
Population and staff According to the Ministry of Justice, on 19 September 2026 the prison held 453 inmates. Its official capacity was 494 places, 225 of which were not available. At the end of August 2026 its staff included 419 officers of the prison police, out of 510 planned.
References