Vignola, Palladio's elder by a few years, displays in his work even more of the scholastically frigid spirit of the late Renaissance, the narrowing of poetic impulse, and the dwindling of vitality, that sadden the second half of the sixteenth century in Italy.

Scamozzi, labouring at Venice on works that Sansovino left unfinished, caught the genial spirit of the old Venetian style.

Alessi, in like manner, at Genoa, felt the influences of a rich and splendour-loving aristocracy.

His church of S.Maria di Carignano is one of the most successful ecclesiastical buildings of the late Renaissance, combining the principles of Bramante and Michael Angelo in close imitation of S.Peter's, and adhering in detail to the canons of the new taste.
These canons were based upon a close study of Vitruvius.

Palladio, Vignola, and Scamozzi were no less ambitious as authors than as architects;[54] their minute analysis of antique treatises on the art of construction led to the formation of exact rules for the treatment of the five classic orders, the proportions of the chief parts used in building, and the correct method of designing theatres and palaces, church-fronts and cupolas.