Convent of Las Descalzas Reales

The convent is located right in the heart of Madrid. It occupies the old palace which was once the residence of Charles I and Isabella of Portugal, and the place where their daughter, Doña Juana, was born in 1535. Her tomb can be seen today in one of the chapels, adorned with a kneeling funerary sculpture by Pompeyo Leoni. It was Doña Juana who founded this convent of barefoot Franciscan nuns in 1557. Numerous ladies of the nobility would seek seclusion at this monastery, taking their personal belongings with them. This is the reason the convent today has such an important collection of paintings, tapestries and religious images. The original structure and many of the decorative elements of this Plateresque palace can still be seen on the interior of the convent. There are 17th-century fresco paintings on the staircase and in the Milagro chapel. Particular highlights include the tapestries woven from cartoons by Rubens, representing the Apotheosis of the Eucharist, in addition to paintings by artists such as Titian, Sánchez Coello, Brueghel and Luini, among others.