Visiting Santa Catalina Monastery in Arequipa
The 16th century Santa Catalina Monastery in Arequipa once housed nuns from the high class Spanish families- at its peak, the huge complex housed up to 150 nuns and 300 servants. At the time, families were expected to send their second child into the service of the church, and paid very high dowries to send their daughters to Santa Catalina. Many lived lives of luxury within the cloistered walls of Santa Catalina, with slaves and servants to attend to them and tales of pregnant nuns floating around. This ended in 1871 when Pope Pius IX requested the monastery’s reform, sending in an overseer to teach the nuns humility.
Today, the entire complex not currently being used for nuns’ residence is open to the public. (The nuns voted to open Santa Catalina to the public in the 70s, to finance restoration after the complex suffered earthquake damage.) Its Mudéjar (Spanish Moor) architecture is accented by arches, domes and other elaborate roofing, and decorative tiling, and is painted in vivid hues of orange and blue. It’s all hidden away from the city by high white walls. Inside, flower-lined streets and plazas give the convent a sense of serenity and, together with the site’s imposing size, have caused it to be described as a ‘city within a city’.
Inside Santa Catalina, you can explore the unchanged rooms and homes where the nuns and servants lived, with the tools that helped them through their daily chores. Macabre religious touches include the postmortem paintings of nuns and saintly hearts in jars. There’s a gift shop as well, and a picturesque outdoor cafe.
Getting There
Santa Catalina is easily found just two blocks from the Plaza de Armas of Arequipa, on Santa Catalina Road. It opens from 8am-8pm on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, and from 9am-5pm the rest of the week (opening an hour earlier during the months of the high season). A S/35 (soles) general admission gets you entry and a map, although there are also guided tours at an additional cost. Pirwa Park Hostel Arequipa is also located in the historic center of Arequipa, a UNESCO World Heritage Site famed for its white sillar (volcanic stone) buildings with mestizo-baroque façades. (Learn what to do & where to go in the historical center of Arequipa.)