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Catedral de Santiago de Cuba

The Lesser Basilica is home to the Monsignor Enrique Perez Serantes Archdiocesan Museum, the only one devoted to religious art on the island  
This is Cuba’s perfect block, made up of Aguilera, San Pedro, Heredia and Santo Tomas streets, in a village about to turn 500 years and anointed to Santiago Apostle. A landmark there is the Cespedes Park, hemmed in by olden works of great architectural value, from the Municipal Government Palace (the former city hall) and the Diego Velazques House all the way to the former San Carlos Club, the Casa Granda Hotel and the emblematic cathedral.
This is the same cathedral that in 1882 was renamed as Lesser Basilica and was consequently declared a National Monument back in 1958. The place harbors the Monsignor Enrique Perez Serantes Archdiocesan Museum, the only one devoted to religious art on the island nation.
Owed to Carlos Segrera’s artistic sensitivity is the current façade of this unmistaken building, commissioned by Italian monsignor Feliz Ambrosio Guerra y Fezzia. This architect, responsible for the all-out urban remodeling of Santiago in the early 20th century, decided to keep the neoclassic details intact and add some classic architectural elements: Corinthian columns, arches and towers.
Word has it that the crosses that Cuba’s first archdiocese had since 1922, damaged by the havocking trail of hurricane Sandy, were cast by Siro Rodriguez, one of the members of the larger-than-life Matamoros Trio, whose other singers were Miguel Matamoros and Rafael Cueto.
Just another detail related to this religious symbol is its wooden steeple, that it, the structure that supports the crosses. But due to Carlos Segrega’s decorative concept, the steeple was plastered with ferrocement in a bid to make it look exactly like the kind of material used for the dome: reinforced cement.
Only that way, boasting an exact recreation of the ancient crosses that have decked out this temple since 1922, the Santiago de Cuba Cathedral clings to its olden but beautiful image.