The Teatro Studio was inaugurated in May 2002, in the ex church which up until the XII Century was dedicated to San Floriano patron saint of the Jesi town community.
The San Floriano church was the seat of the most important public ceremonies of Jesi, such as the Palio's Presentation, presented every year on 4th of May on the part of the Castles of Jesi as a sign of submission to the town. Lorenzo Lotto realized splendid works for this church, paintings like Deposition (1512), Triptych of the Annunciation (1527) and Pala di Santa Lucia (1532), which now can be admired in the Municipal Art Gallery (Pinacoteca Civica of Jesi).
The present form with a central plan-with a large oval based dome, deep semicircle apse and two main, round vaulted chapels-derives from the transformation that began in 1743 on the previous building. Luigi Mancini, the same Jesi painter who had painted the entry of Fredrick II for the historic curtain of the Pergolesi Theatre, was called in 1885 to fresco the dome with the Storie di San Francesco. On this subject, another significant connection should be pointed out: the works for the new layout of the interiors and of the great staircase of the monastery belonging to the San Floriano church, completed in 1784 according to the project of Francesco Maria Ciaraffoni, were so esteemed by the Jesi society that few years later, in 1790, the same architect of Fano (Francesco Maria Ciaraffoni) was commissioned to design the new theatre-Teatro della Concordia (the previous name of the Pergolesi Theatre).
After 1860 the church was deconsecrated and handed over to the state and it became the premises of the Municipal Library and Municipal Art Gallery.
The new theatre site conserves and enhances the spectacular splendour that is typical of the baroque church model, enhanced by the rich XIX Century pictorial decorations in imitation marbles.
The planning of the new design for Teatro Studio San Floriano was entrusted to Italo Rota (1952), internationally famous Milan architect, who created inside the late-baroque structure a sort of permanent theatrical scenography, functional and at the same time burlesque, with a marked contemporary impression but able to interact with the architectural and decorative elements of the period: an environment of great grandeur for “studying" experimenting different ways of performing.
Moreover, in the theatre spaces and in the rooms belonging to the theatre on the ground floor, exhibition can be carried out too. An example is the exhibition that took place in the summer of 2003 dedicated to an extraordinary, if not unique, collection of background scenes and XVIII Century scenes of a puppet theatre, painted on canvas and deriving from the palazzo of the Marquis Merighi of Jesi. The collection, belonging to the diocese, was entrusted to the municipality to be displayed and admired together with the conspicuous theatrical heritage of Jesi.
