Saint Mary
The church you are approaching is the Church of Santa Maria, known locally as Meryem Ana Doğuş Kilisesi or Santa Maria İtalyan Latin Katolik Kilisesi, a Catholic parish in Istanbul. Located in the Büyükdere quarter of Sarıyer, the building was founded by Franciscan priests and dedicated to the Virgin Mary. Construction began in 1864 and the church opened for worship in 1866, a mid-19th-century expansion of the city’s Catholic presence. Swiss architect Gaspare Fossati (1809–1883) designed the two-storey basilica-plan in a Neoclassical style, with interior walls and altarpieces featuring Marian imagery drawn from Bible narratives. An organ built by Rieger Orgelbau was installed in 1914, having originally arrived in 1875 for the chapel of the Lycée Notre Dame de Sion in Istanbul. …
AI-generated from open data and cross-checked, with review where noted. How we write narrations
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