Leon Battista Alberti (1404-72) - writer, painter and sculptor, mathematician and, most famously, architectural theorist and architect - came closer than anyone to the Renaissance ideal of the 'complete man'. Recognised by his contemporaries as an extraordinary person, he helped to shape, through his writings and his practical example in the arts, the way in which the natural and artificial world was perceived and represented during the Renaissance. In this book - the first digest of Alberti's architecture to be published for twenty-five years - Robert Tavernor examines a variety of themes: the relationship between the architect and his patrons; his writings on the visual arts and his practical example; his significance for the extension of architectural theory into practice; and his success in raising the status of architecture to an art - one that sought to be in harmony with the natural world. The various building projects with which Alberti is known to have been involved are discussed in detail and placed in approximate chronological order, as well as being described in relation to the role of the patrons and builders and given an historical context.