Convent of San Antonio el Real, Salamanca, Religious monument in central Salamanca, Spain.
The Convent of San Antonio el Real is a former monastic building in Salamanca featuring architectural characteristics from the 18th century. The structure displays an octagonal dome reinforced with dressed stone at its corners.
The Franciscan convent was built in 1745 by Fray Francisco de la Visitación. Its church was never finished, and the cloister was added a few years later by Jerónimo García de Quiñones. The monastic buildings disappeared; the cloister site is now occupied by the Teatro del Liceo, and the church remains are integrated into a Zara store. It was declared a Bien de Interés Cultural on 26 March 1997.
The convent belonged to the Franciscan order, and its church was never finished; the surviving dome over the crossing, with its windows cut through the squinches, is described as an original type within Spanish Baroque. The former cloister site is now occupied by the Teatro del Liceo, and a clothing store has rehabilitated the space, leaving the old church walls and dome visible.
The remains stand inside the urban centre of Salamanca, with the former church walls and dome visible within the Liceo theatre and the adjoining Zara store. The conventual rooms have disappeared and the site is now occupied by other buildings, so the medieval cloister is not walkable; look for the octagonal drum and the dome from the surrounding streets.
The church was never finished, and its dome over scalloped pendentives with windows is described as an original type within Spanish Baroque. The octagonal drum, with rough masonry walls rendered and dressed stone at the corners, rises above the Zara store, which occupies the former cloister site.
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