Metropolitan Cathedral of Medellín, Catholic cathedral in Villanueva, Medellín, Colombia

The Metropolitan Cathedral of Medellín, dedicated to the Immaculate Conception, stands in the Villanueva neighbourhood north of Parque de Bolívar. The French architect Charles Émile Carré designed it in Neo-Romanesque style: a Latin-cross plan with three longitudinal naves crossed by a transept, built of solid brick. Its two square towers rise 53.20 m to the cross, and the tan and reddish-brown brickwork covers 4,608 m² of plan.

The diocese of Medellín was created in 1868, and from 1886 Bishop Bernardo Herrera Restrepo pushed the building of a new cathedral, designed by French architect Charles Émile Carré in Romanesque Revival style. The brick structure was completed in stages, and in 1948 Pope Pius XII granted it the title of Minor Basilica. In 2004 it was declared a Bien de Interés Cultural of national character.

The cathedral serves as the spiritual center of the Archdiocese of Medellín and shapes the city's religious life through its central location. Worshippers and visitors gather here for services, weddings, and other key moments in the liturgical calendar.

The cathedral is located near the central plaza and is easily accessible via the Parque Berrío metro station. Visitors can walk in during daytime hours to pray or view the architecture, even if a service is underway.

The cathedral's walls hold roughly 1,120,000 solid bricks of 8 cubic decimetres each, set with mortar around a volume of 97,000 cubic metres. The Italian architect Giovanni Buscaglione designed the baldachin, altars, pulpit, choir, stained glass and floors. A small religious art museum in a room next to the basilica, with about 40 paintings from the 17th to 19th centuries and 15 sculptures from the 18th and 19th, is not open to the public.