Cathedral of La Laguna

Stand still for a moment in the small square in front of the cathedral. The air up here is often cooler and damper than on the coast, and on many mornings a soft mist drifts across the rooftops. Listen. You may hear pigeons on the stone ledges, footsteps on the paving, a church bell somewhere across town. Above you rise two pale towers and a row of tall columns. This is the Cathedral of Our Lady of Los Remedios, the cathedral of La Laguna.

Before we look at the building, look at the town around it. San Cristóbal de La Laguna was founded after the Castilian conquest of Tenerife at the end of the fifteenth century. Its streets were laid out in a fairly regular grid, with no defensive walls. Historians often point to this plan as an early model for Spanish colonial cities in the Americas. In 1999, UNESCO added the old town to its World Heritage list. So the cathedral sits inside a town that is itself a monument.

The story of this site begins with a much humbler building. In the early sixteenth century, settlers built a parish church here dedicated to Our Lady of Los Remedios. For about three hundred years, it served as a parish church, not a cathedral. It grew slowly, with new chapels and altars added by local families. Then, in 1819, the Pope created a new diocese for the western Canary Islands. La Laguna became its seat, and this parish church was raised to the rank of cathedral.

Now look closely at the façade in front of you. It is neoclassical — a style that copies the calm lines of ancient Greek and Roman temples. You can see the columns, the triangular pediment, and the clean, symmetrical shape. This front was added in the early nineteenth century, around the time the church became a cathedral. Here is the first surprise. The façade is older than most of the building behind it. The front stayed, but the main body was later pulled down.

Why was it pulled down? By the late nineteenth century, the old church was in a poor state. The structure had serious problems, and parts of it were not safe. At the start of the twentieth century, the decision came to demolish most of the old building and rebuild it. The new church was built in a neo-Gothic style. That means it uses pointed arches and ribbed vaults, inspired by medieval cathedrals. The work took place roughly between 1905 and 1913.

Here is the second surprise, and it is one that most visitors miss. Those Gothic-looking vaults are not made of carved stone in the medieval way. They were built with reinforced concrete, which was a new material at that time. The cathedral is often described as one of the earliest buildings in Spain to use reinforced concrete for its vaults. So, behind a classical front and under a medieval-style roof, there is a piece of early modern engineering.

That modern material later brought its own trouble. Over the decades, moisture and the local climate damaged the concrete. Cracks appeared, and the structure became unsafe again. In 2002, the cathedral closed to the public. For more than ten years, the doors stayed shut while engineers studied the building and planned a careful restoration. The cathedral finally reopened in 2014. Many local people remember those years when their cathedral stood silent at the centre of town.

When you step inside, let your eyes adjust to the light. The nave is tall and the pointed arches carry your gaze upward. The restored vaults are lighter in colour than many visitors expect. Daylight comes in through the windows and falls on the pale surfaces. The space feels open and calm. Take a moment to notice the sound, too. Voices soften, footsteps echo, and the noise of the street outside fades quickly once the door closes behind you.

One of the treasures here is the pulpit. It is carved from marble that was brought from Genoa, in Italy, in the eighteenth century. Look at the curves and the fine detail in the stone. It is a reminder that the Canary Islands sat on major sea routes. Ships connected Tenerife with Europe, Africa and the Americas. Art, money and ideas travelled along those routes, and some of them ended up here, in the churches of La Laguna.

The cathedral also holds the remains of Alonso Fernández de Lugo. He was the Castilian commander who led the conquest of Tenerife and founded this town. His story is not a simple one. The conquest ended the independent world of the Guanches, the native people of the island. Standing near his tomb, it is worth remembering both sides of that history — the founding of a new town, and the end of an older island society.

As you walk along the side aisles, look into the chapels. Many of them hold altarpieces, called retablos in Spanish. These are large carved and painted panels set behind an altar, often covered in gold leaf. Some of the works here survived from the older church that once stood on this spot. They carry the taste and the faith of local families over several centuries. Each chapel has its own character, so move slowly and compare them.

Outside again, notice how the cathedral fits into its street. It does not stand on a wide open plaza like many great cathedrals in Europe. Instead, it sits close to the surrounding houses, with their wooden balconies and painted walls. A few minutes away, the Church of the Conception, with its tall bell tower, competes for attention. La Laguna has many churches and convents, and the cathedral is one part of that larger religious landscape.

Before you leave, turn back once more and look at the two towers against the sky. Think of the layers you have just seen. A sixteenth-century parish, a nineteenth-century classical front, a twentieth-century concrete church dressed as medieval Gothic, and a twenty-first-century rescue. As you walk away down these straight streets, listen for the bells and watch how the mist, or the sun, moves across the old roofs of La Laguna.