Monastery of San Ignacio de Loyola Monasterio de San Ignacio de Loyola

The church at the Monastery of San Ignacio de Loyola, with a 65m/213ft high dome by Joaquín de Churriguera, is one of the finest of its kind in Spain; it was completed only in the mid-18th century. The interior is richly decorated with marble and semi-precious stones, and on the sumptuous Baroque high altar, between twisted columns, is a silver statue of St Ignatius.

In the left wing of the monastery is the Santa Casa, the house in which St Ignatius of Loyola was born, which has a Mudéjar-style exterior. Visitors are shown the room in which the saint was born and the sickroom in which he resolved to abandon a military career.