The station was inaugurated on 3 February 1848 to serve the railway to
Pistoia and Pisa, and was initially called
Maria Antonia (from the name of the railway, named in honour of
Princess Maria Antonia of the Two Sicilies); it was much closer to the
Santa Maria Novella church than the current station. It was renamed after the church after the
unification of Italy. The Florentine sculptor
Romano Romanelli publicly attacked the original proposals by government architect
Mazzoni in editorials in the city's main daily newspaper,
La Nazione. design, the use of pietra forte (a hard sandstone) for the station's stone frontage was intended to respond to and contrast with the nearby
Gothic architecture of the church of Santa Maria Novella. The interior of the station features a dramatic metal and glass roof with large skylights over the main passenger concourse, which is aligned perpendicular to the tracks and acts as a pedestrian street. The skylights span the passenger concourse without any supporting columns, giving a feeling of openness and vast space and reinforcing the convergence of all the public functions of the station on the passenger concourse. Near platform #16 there is a statue and a memorial plaque in remembrance of the train loads of Jewish people who were deported from Italy to
Nazi concentration camps during
World War II. ==Train services==