Peruzzi, Baldassare Tommaso (1481–1536)

Sienese architect and painter. Apart from five years (1527–32), he worked mainly in Rome. His first significant work was a villa for Agostino Chigi (now the Villa Farnesina), 1509–11, where the decoration was by Raphael and assistants, including Peruzzi himself. He succeeded Raphael as architect to St Peter's in 1520, but returned to Siena in 1527, after the Sack of Rome, where he worked with Antonio da Sangallo the Younger on the Villa Caprarola in 1530. His final work, the Palazzo Massimo alle Colonne, Rome, 1532–36, was sited at a difficult location (it is at a sharp curve in the road) and consequently has several unorthodox features.