A cultural landmark and part of the city’s architectural heritage, the Comfama Cloister in San Ignacio has been a historical gathering spot for the community. From downtown Medellin we’ve assisted thousands of people through our programs and services, reconciling our relationship with the past while, at the same time, opening the door to new opportunities and experiences that transcend nostalgia.
The Cloister’s history goes back more than a century when, under the tutelage of Fray Rafael de la Serna, it was established that the place would be ground for religious formation and cult for its neighbours in the Candelaria Village. As time passed by, the building’s identity and higher purpose changed, turning into San Ignacio School headquarters, then into offices for priests, and finally into Comfama ’s educational and cultural center.
The Cloister, which sees close to a million visitors every year, is the result of an architectural intervention started by Horacio M. Rodriguez in 1917 and followed by Agustin Goovaerts in 1920. Since then, the building’s played a key role in the cultural and educational scene of Medellin: In 1923 the theatre yard hosted Antioquia’s first theatre play: El triunfo de la inocencia; it hosted the first X-ray machine test in Antioquia as well as the ignition of the city’s first power generator. The first astronomical and meteorological observatory was housed in the Cloister’s tower, and the first academic lecture on thermodynamics took place in its classrooms.
In 2016, Comfama started a new process of transformation on the building, aligned with the organization’s cultural and educational vocation and with the goal of preserving the city’s history, defending its heritage and generating space for inspiration, creation and reflexive thinking.
