Minor Basilica of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Minor basilica in Pinciano district, Rome, Italy
The Minor Basilica of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, on Piazza Euclide, was designed by Armando Brasini with a Greek cross plan inscribed in a circle. Its cream-stone facade has a projecting portico of four smooth Doric columns about 12 m high, flanked by lower columned wings and topped by a pediment inscribed with the dedication of 1952. The planned dome was never built; only a brick drum with four small square windows remains.
Construction began in 1923 after the Holy See approved the land transfer, with the foundation stone laid in July 1924. Work continued over several decades, extending through 1951 as different phases of the project took shape.
The church is served by the Claretian Missionaries, who received it in 1936; the order's coat of arms appears on the pediment and portico. The central door carries the Latin motto "Ave Cor Mariae, esto salus mundi". In the Chapel of the Madonna of Pompei are Brasini's plaster models for four Evangelist statues meant for the facade but never carved.
The basilica faces Piazza Euclide in the Pinciano district, north of the historic centre. Enter through the portico's three monumental doors; the baptistery lies at the far end of the narthex on the right. The planned dome was never built, so the brick drum with four small square windows is all that rises above the roofline.
The original design called for a grand dome to crown the church, but only a smaller drum was completed instead. This change significantly altered the building's exterior appearance from what architects had originally envisioned.
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