Santa Maria di Caravaggio Church, Minor basilica and parish church in Porta Ticinese, Milan, Italy
Santa Maria di Caravaggio is a Romanesque Revival church on via Francesco Borromini in Milan's Porta Ticinese district, built between 1906 and 1911 to a design by Cecilio Arpesani. Beneath the main floor a large crypt decorated with mosaics holds the statues of the Madonna di Caravaggio and of Giannetta, the young witness of the apparition.
The first church on the site was a wooden structure designed by Alfredo Campanini, inaugurated on 7 September 1902 after a procession led by Cardinal Andrea Carlo Ferrari. It replaced an earlier church and housed the statue of the Madonna di Caravaggio and Blessed Giannetta. As the wooden building deteriorated, parish priest Giuseppe Cappelletti commissioned Cecilio Arpesani to design a permanent church. The first stone was laid on 24 June 1906, and Cardinal Ferrari consecrated the new building on 1 May 1911.
The church is dedicated to the sanctuary of Caravaggio, a pilgrimage site in Lombardy where the Virgin Mary is said to have appeared in the 15th century. Inside, votive offerings and devotional art reflect this connection, and local worshippers still use the space for regular prayer.
The church is easy to reach on foot from central Milan, as Porta Ticinese is well served by tram lines. Those who want to visit the crypt below should avoid arriving during a Mass, when parts of the building may be less accessible.
The bell tower was added in 1929–1930 to a design by the Milanese engineer-architect Ugo Zanchetta. It houses a ring of six bells in a D major diatonic scale, cast in 1949 by the Carlo Ottolina e figli Enrico e Secondo foundry in Seregno.
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