Off the traditional art trail, new museums continue to pop up in Madrid. Right on San Bernardo Street, between Malasaña and Conde Duque, the first permanent museum in Spain dedicated entirely to Leonardo da Vinci has just opened, joining an exclusive network of only six museums of this kind worldwide: four in Italy, one in France, and now one in the capital.
The Leonardo Da Vinci Museum Madrid opened to the public on February 13 at 39 San Bernardo Street, in a space of over 300 square meters adapted as an immersive journey through the mind of the Renaissance genius. It is a privately funded project, directed by Pedro Macarro, that aims to become a benchmark for understanding Leonardo’s polymathism: artist, engineer, inventor, anatomist, and visionary all at once.
More than 50 machines drawn from his codices
The heart of the museum is its collection of more than 50 handcrafted replicas of machines and inventions designed by Leonardo, all built in meticulous detail according to the original 15th-century codices. Many of the models are functional and allow visitors to understand the mechanics that the Florentine imagined centuries before helicopters, tanks, or diving suits existed.
Among the most striking pieces are: Leonardo’s helicopter prototype, a vertical flight machine that foreshadows the concept of the rotor, as well as a diving suit designed to explore the seabed and sabotage ships from underwater, and designs for armored tanks, war machines, swing bridges, and hydraulic devices that showcase his work as a military and civil engineer.
The replicas are made of wood and metal, with a level of detail that allows visitors to visualize how they would have functioned in practice and how they were ahead of their time.
Six themed galleries: from engineer to painter
The exhibition is organized into six thematic galleries that divide Leonardo’s universe into digestible sections: civil engineering, military engineering, flying machines, hydraulics, anatomy, and, finally, painting. In each gallery, bilingual panels (Spanish and English) explain the historical context, the problem Leonardo was trying to solve, and the technical solution he proposed, with diagrams taken from his manuscripts.
The final section is dedicated to his paintings, featuring reproductions of his most iconic works and explanations of composition, the use of light, sfumato, and the relationship between his scientific approach and his painting style. The aim is for visitors to leave understanding that the Mona Lisa or The Last Supper cannot be separated from his obsession with anatomy, perspective, or optics.