After studying painting and architecture, Salvi competed unsuccessfully in 1732 for the commission to make the facade of San Giovanni in Laterano, Rome, but in the same year his project for the Trevi Fountain was chosen in preference to those of many competitors. Most of his energy was absorbed by the work; he was responsible not only for the overall design but also for the details of the decoration and the program of the statuary. After Salvi's death, Giuseppe Pannini finished the fountain in 1762, somewhat altering the original scheme. The idea of combining palace front and fountain was derived from a project by Pietro da Cortona, but the grand pageantry of the fountain's central triumphal arch with its mythological and allegorical figures, natural rock formations, and gushing water was Salvi's. Salvi also executed minor works in churches and, with Luigi Vanvitelli (Vanvitelli, Luigi), enlarged Gian Lorenzo Bernini's Odescalchi Palace.