Portal de Cartagena

www.portaldecartagena.com

• Home
• Business
• Hotels
• Restaurants
• News
• Advertisement

From tomorrow until January 17, the parish of Santa María de Gracia de Cartagena will celebrate the acts of blessing and inauguration of its main and lateral facades, whose restoration began in October 2018.

The celebrations will begin tomorrow, Thursday, at 7:30 p.m., with the solemn Eucharist in honor of Saint Fulgencio, patron of the Diocese.

Then there will be a concert by the music band “Sauces� and tasting of the traditional sweet potato accompanied by sweet wine.

On Friday, at 20:00 hours, the blessing and touch of the rattle will take place in the atrium of the temple, followed by the explanation of the origin and functionality of this instrument, by the bell and doctor in social anthropology Francesc Llops y Bayó .

Next, the architects responsible for the restoration of the temple, Juan de Dios and Luis de la Hoz, will explain the process that has been carried out.

The day will conclude with the inauguration of the explanatory panels of the restoration.

Finally, on Saturday, at 7:00 p.m., the Bishop of Cartagena, Mons. José Manuel Lorca Planes, accompanied by his auxiliary bishop, Mons. Sebastián Chico Martínez, and the Archbishop Emeritus of Burgos, Mons. Francisco Gil Hellín, will bless the facades, atrium and images of the four saints of the main cover of Santa María de Gracia and will preside over the Eucharist.

At the end of the Mass, the documentation and end of work will be delivered.

A complex restoration

The restoration works of the parish church of Santa María de Gracia began in October 2018. The initial project had an execution time of six months, however, at the beginning of the restoration works on the facade of Calle del Aire, the architects discovered its original configuration and decided to recover it.

“The facades had been greatly affected by the passage of time and previous works, which had significantly changed both the materials and the appearance of the temple.

At the beginning of the work we were able to verify the existence of remains of the original configuration of a large part of walls, cornices and other decorations, which led us to propose the recovery of a finish formed by ceramic brick, with completion in sight, �explains Luis de Dios de la Hoz, director architect of the restoration work.

The recovery of the main facade with this original completion increased the time of execution of the work, since it involved the manufacture of about eleven thousand new bricks and the restoration of hundreds of different demolitions and large pieces based on molds filled with concrete Lime and colored sand.

In addition, on this facade, the four niches have also been recovered in which the images of the four saints of Cartagena will be placed - San Leandro, Saint Florentina, San Isidoro and San Fulgencion made in natural stone by the sculptor Lauren García .

On the other hand, the upper body of the tower that now houses three new bells - opened and blessed in June - and a new wooden rattle, a replica of the original, has also been rebuilt.

In addition, the facade of the San Miguel street has also been recovered, in which an old door whose structure appeared during the restoration has been left marked without opening.

"When doing the tastings, we discovered the existence of doors to the street on this facade, so we decided to leave them marked on the walls of the temple, without opening inwards, to remember its original structure and as a possible object of future phases", clarifies the architect.

Source: Obispado de Cartagena