Here comes another little gem found quite by mistake. I went to see a different church that I had wanted to photograph for ages (and I did, but photos suck, so I will have to repeat it) and was already on my way back home when I passed an interesting door. My curiosity always wins, so I got in...
And wow!
Igreja Italiana de Nossa Senhora do Loreto
Church of Our Lady of the Loreto of the Italians
There is not so much gold as in the one I blew up shooting, but the warm stone around, carvings, and large paintings make it quite stunning.
Like many Lisbon churches it had a quite rough history.
Here are few facts:
1518 - Church of Loreto was erected
1651 - Fire with serious destruction.
1676 - Completion of the reconstruction. 12 statues of the Apostles, dozens of paintings and precious marbles were imported from Genoa.
1755 - Earthquake and fire heavily damaged the Church.
1785 - End of reconstruction. The twelve paintings of the Apostles in the niches are by Cirillo Wolkmar Machado.
1792 - The celebration of Sunday Mass at 1 pm begins, which continues to this day.
1862 - Rector Peragallo, born in Chiávari, introduces chairs for the faithful, an absolute novelty in Portugal.
source
Every corner of it is absolutely beautiful.
And then someone has this lovely idea to put a huge ugly-ass lamp. I think it was the first time I saw something like that. Big, black oval right in your face. Yes - the stunning ceiling is very well lit (and what a ceiling it is!), but there are other, less disturbing ways to do it that other places practice, and it works too.
So ugly!
I tried to avoid it on the photos somehow, but it was nearly impossible if I wanted to catch lurcher areas.
How to enjoy the view with this thing hanging there?
Besides the extra annoying lamp there were some preparations going on, and I didn't want to disturb too much. I missed the shot of the sides so borrowed it. But I will come back there one of these days to see it again. Hopefully with less people around and my phone charged (it takes better pictures in dark places than the camera and has wider angle than the lens I use 🤷♀).
Image source
Beautiful entrance with stairs (which I did not forget to shoot this time). There is also a since one that I entered with, but this one is much prettier. Again, the amount of tourists at that time... They were everywhere!
And in case you want to go and have a look, here it is. Stuck between some regular buildings:
google maps
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Shot with Nikon D5500 + Nikkor 18-55mm lens
All photos and text are my own.