Similarly, the early Renaissance architect Brunelleschi used Roman techniques and influenced Michelozzo. The open colonnaded court that is the center of the palazzo plan has roots in the cloisters that developed from Roman peri styles. The once open corner loggia and shop fronts facing the street were walled in during the 16th century. They were replaced by Michelangelo's unusual ground-floor "kneeling windows" (finestre inginocchiate) with exaggerated scrolling consoles appearing to support the sill and framed in a pedimented aedicule a motif repeated in his new main doorway.[citation needed] The new windows are set into what appears to be a walled infill of the original arched opening, a Mannerist expression Michelangelo and others used repeatedly.
The "kneeling windows" a feature later copied by the Medici at their Palazzo Pitti, also in Florence.
The building reflects the accumulated wealth of the Medici family. The fifteen-year-old Galeazzo Maria Sforza was entertained in Florence in 17 April 1459, and left a letter describing, perhaps in the accomplished terms of a secretary, the all-but-complete palazzo, where his whole entourage was nobly accommodated: