The construction of Palazzo Pfanner dates back to 1660. It was the Moriconi family, members of the Lucca merchant nobility that commissioned its building. Ruined down by bankruptcy the Moriconi family was forced in 1680 to sell the building to the Controni family, silk merchant who had risen to the nobility. The Controni family extended the building: about 1686 they presided over the building of the grand monumental staircase, presumably on the plans of the Lucca architect Domenico Martinelli, active especially in the European capitals of Vienna and Prague; at the beginning of the 18th century they commissioned, in all probability, Filippo Juvarra to upgrade the garden behind; still in the same period they entrusted local 'quadraturisti' painters with decorating the vaults of the staircase and the inside of the aristocratic residence.