A picturesque, exalted, architectural style which prevailed in ecclesiastical architecture for nearly two centuries, and which is associated mainly with Michelangelo, its creator, and with the architects Bernini and Borromini. It is an interpretation of joy, the characteristic of which is imagination, picturesqueness, immensity, and harmony between building and environment, with a suggestion of movement, symbolism, and color. It employs curves, towers, and characteristic cupolas, often accompanied by two subordinate towers. Copper caps, sometimes turnip-shaped, are also used, together with stairways symbolic of penitential progress, just as the interiors are flooded, symbolically, with light. Barocco has been often misrepresented by fanciers of other architectural styles.