San Biagio is one of the finest Renaissance churches in Italy and Montepulciano's most important monument. Standing alone on a terrace on the hillside below the town walls, reached by a cypress-lined path from the main road, it was built as a pilgrimage church on the site of a miraculous image of the Madonna. The travertine exterior glows in morning and evening light, and the relationship between the building and its hilltop setting is as carefully considered as the architecture itself.
Antonio da Sangallo the Elder designed the church as a demonstration piece of High Renaissance principles: a Greek cross plan, a central dome, classical proportions throughout. Inside, the space is cool and harmonious, the dome rising on pendentives above the crossing. The adjacent canon's house (canonica) is a smaller building by the same architect, and the two together in their garden setting make one of the most satisfying architectural compositions in Tuscany.