Convent of La Merced, Mexico City facts for kids
The Convent of Nuestra Señora de La Merced was once a big religious building in Mexico City. Most of it was taken down to make room for new buildings. Today, only a beautiful part called the cloister remains. This cloister was part of a monastery built by the Mercedarian order in the late 1500s and early 1600s.
You can find it in the historic downtown of Mexico City, near Uruguay and Talavera Streets. The area around it, the metro station, and a famous market are all named after this old convent.
History of the Convent
The Order of Mercedarians arrived in Mexico in 1593. They built the La Merced Monastery in Mexico City between the 16th and 17th centuries. This was before they set up other churches and missions across Mexico.
A famous architect named Juan de Herrera designed and built the complex. The church, which is now gone, was started in 1594. It was finished by the mid-1600s. The second part, mostly the upper floor, was completed in 1703.
In 1862, laws called the Reform Laws caused many church buildings to be destroyed. The church and other parts of this monastery were taken down. Only the cloister you see today was left. We know what the monastery looked like before from an 1842 painting by Pedro Gualdi.
After the Reform Laws, the building was used as a military barracks. This caused some damage, especially to the west and south sides. Later, the cloister became a gym, a school, a museum, and even a workshop for making tapestries.
The building survived partly because artist Dr. Atl lived and worked there in the 1920s. When he moved in, it was in very bad shape. He even had to live on the roof! He later fixed the patio and other parts of the building. From 1927 to the 1930s, it was home to a famous art school called the Escuela Nacional de Pintura, Escultura y Grabado.
What the Cloister Looks Like
The cloister is special because it mixes two styles: Baroque and Mudéjar. Many people say it's one of the most beautiful monasteries ever built in Mexico. It has amazing decorations.
In the middle, there's a patio. This patio is surrounded by two floors of columns and arches. Behind these are walkways where people could stroll. A large staircase leads up to the second floor and a tower near the street.
On each of the patio's four sides, seven columns on the ground floor split into fourteen columns on the upper floor. The columns on the ground floor are simple, in the Doric style. The center stone of each arch, called a keystone, has a carved picture of an apostle or a Mercedarian friar.
The columns on the upper floor were built later and have more decorations. They are covered with lattice patterns mixed with plants and fruits. The spaces between the columns are decorated in the Baroque style. You can see carved images of Mercedarian friars in the triangles above the arches. Small pyramids point downwards from the underside of the arches.
See also
In Spanish: Convento de la Merced (Ciudad de México) para niños
- List of colonial churches in Mexico City
