Chiostro di San Francesco

The Cloister of San Francesco in Ostuni preserves part of the former Franciscan convent incorporated into the town hall complex. Arcades of local stone enclose a rectangular courtyard, linking the city's religious architecture with its later civic life.

Why it matters

The cloister makes the history of the convent visible within an administrative setting. It is an eighteenth-century architectural space belonging to a religious institution with much older origins.

What to notice

Arches rest on worked stone columns, with vaulted passages around the open courtyard. The repeated supports and enclosed plan give the space a rhythm distinct from the streets and square outside. The surrounding building records later adaptations of the former convent.

Context and history

The Franciscan house is associated with the early fourteenth century. The surviving rectangular cloister was built in 1739 to a design by Pietro Magarelli. Suppression in the early nineteenth century ended the friars' occupation, and civic adaptation followed. The cloister therefore belongs to both the monastic history of Ostuni and the later development of its municipal institutions.