Cathedral Basilica of Potosí

The Cathedral of Villa Imperial de Potosí or Cathedral of Potosí, the official name is Cathedral Basilica of Nuestra Señora de La Paz is a minor basilica and cathedral with baroque and neoclassical colonial influence. It has a stone façade and is located in Plaza 10 de Noviembre in the center of this Bolivian city of Potosí. It was built between 1809 and 1836 on the site where the old church collapsed in 1807. Its main promoter was the Friar Manuel Sanahuya.

The 19th century entered the Neoclassical style, leaving us, among other works, its maximum example, the new Major Church, today the Cathedral Basilica corresponding to the years 1809-1836, and whose author was the Spanish, Franciscan friar and architect by profession Manuel de Sanahuja, introducer in Potosí of the Neoclassical style, who simultaneously to the Cathedral did other works in both religious and civil architecture. The hand of Sanahuja is evident in the cathedral in the quality of its architectural space that incorporates reredos designed by himself. Moved to La Paz, he died there in 1834. Local architecture ends with the Potosí cathedral, and the series of great cathedrals in Latin America reaches its culmination in the Neoclassical style.

Inside there are important religious relics of gold and silver. Also an organ donated by Simón I. Patiño. One sector functions as a museum of religious art.

The current Cathedral Basilica, which occupies the same space as its predecessor, is the work of the architect Friar Manuel de Sanahuja, who began it on Tuesday, September 6, 1808. It was completed in 1836, consecrating it solemnly on April 4, 1838, in the Presidency of Marshal Andrés de Santa Cruz, who sponsored the ceremony.