Iglesia San Agustín de Melipilla – Architecture

The church has a straight and clean-line structure, comprising a large parallelepiped crowned with a gable roof and a bell tower. It is made out of adobe; therefore it has serious damages caused by the 2010 earthquake.

The exterior façade ornamentation is rather moderate, mainly inspired in European Romanesque influences. It has a main entrance decorated on both sides by double columns supporting a semicircular arch, without embossments or another type of additional decoration. Both sides of the façade structure have a big ribbed pilaster ending up in the roof.

In the upper part of the entrance, and continuing with the symmetry axis, there are three windows crowned in semicircular arches, being the central one the highest.

The tower, also a parallelepiped, displays more decoration: it has double semicircular arches embedded into larger arches, as well as a series of lobed elements descending from the ceiling, as they were influenced by muqarnas shapes inspired in the Islamic architecture. The tower is crowned with a gable roof ending in a cross.

The simplicity of the façade is emulated indoors. The church layout comprises a single rectangular nave, painted in white, with a segmental barrel vault in the ceiling. Façade windows, as well as those along the perimeter walls, illuminate the interior and reveal the true thickness of adobe walls built for supporting the structure weight. There are two lintelled lateral entrances in the middle of the nave.

Altar area is separated from the rest of the nave by a semicircular arch and a balustrade that evidences two steep steps.