Whether or not you are a fan of Baroque, you can’t fail to be impressed by the exuberant buildings style on display in Lecce. At the end of the 16th century the arrival of many religious orders (Jesuits, Teatini and Franciscans) brought an influx of wealth which paid for the opulent churches and palazzi that still permeate today’s city.
Nicknamed the ‘Florence of the South’, Lecce is considered by many Italians to be the country’s most beautiful Southern city. Most buildings at the heart of the city are built out of the local limestone, a soft material which lends itself beautifully to the art of sculpture. It is called pietra leccese because it’s native to this area. It is a special kind of limestone that can be found and extracted locally, from nearby quarries. The flowery style of Lecce owes as much to the materials to hand as to the skills of the architects: the soft local sandstone can be intricately carved and then becomes hard with age.
The Baroque style here is also from the area. It is a Baroque style, although it is not typically Baroque, it is different from the Baroque styles in Naples or Rome, for example. In Lecce there are many great examples. The church of Santa Croce (Holy Cross) is the iconical feature of Lecce’s Baroque stile. At a first look it appears to be overwhelmed, a bit over the top. But that’s exactly the effect Baroque art was trying to achieve: artists wanted to dazzle the viewer through a triumphal use of stone. It uses an array of sculptural effects which are beautifully rendered here. It is a decorative and eclectic style of architecture, in which carved details are made up of natural elements. There are lots of representations of fruits and flowers. It is almost as people were trying pay homage to the divine through the depiction of everyday natural elements which are the fruits of their labour.
Of course the symbolism of these buildings can also be read on a more complex level. The buildings also represent the triumph of Christianity over paganism.
It took over one hundred years to build this extraordinary church. Here you can see layer upon layer of work, produced by generation after generation of architects.
Discover more on my website
Contact me