Churches | Turin churches |
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Sanctuary of the ConsolataThe sanctuary, located near the city centre is an obligatory stop, with the entrance in the little square with the same name. The original church is documented ever since the 10th century; consecrated to Sant'Andrea, it gave hospitality to the monks escaped from the abbey of Novalesa due to the lack of safety.  Sanctuary of the Consolata Around the year 1000 the monks enlarged the Turinese priorate making use of the work of the monk-builder Brunigo, to whom is also attributed, in the 11th century, the construction of the bell tower. Realized in bare bricks, the bell tower is articulated in seven levels, stressed by fillets of hanging little arches of two ashlars grouped in series, divided in the lower levels by a pilaster of semicircular section; going up, the structure is enlightened both from the reduction of the brickworks thickness and by the progressive increasing of the openings. The worship of Maria Consolatrice affirms itself since the end of the 16th century; its actual icon has been traced back to the patronage of the cardinal Domenico della Rovere. Since 1678 the church began to assume the actual shapes and plant: Guarino Guarini transformed the nave of the ancient Sant'Andrea into the present elliptical entrance hall, while the sanctuary for the Marian icon was created in a new hexagonal chapel on the northern side, concluded by Antonio Bertola in 1703. The new axiality of the project made by Guarini was confirmed by a further elliptical chapel, added by Filippo Juvarra in order to host a new high altar with the Eucharistic tabernacle and the venerated Marian icon (1729). The actual aspect of the sanctuary is due to the interventions realized in the 1830s and in the beginning of the 20th century: the re-moulding of the crypt of the Madonna delle Grazie, pronaos on the little square on the south, opened in 1846 and restoration in 1885 directed by G.B. Ferrante. Also to mention the complex intervention realized by Carlo Ceppi (1898-1904), which crowns the sanctuary with elliptical chapels in a neo-baroque shape, after having demolished the perimetral parts of the plan made by Guarini. Information: |