Cathedral Basilica Minor of the Immaculate Conception, Merida, Venezuela.

Its beginnings date with the founding of the city. In the 18th century, Bishop Fray Juan Ramos de Lora (also founder of the University of Los Andes) elevated it as a cathedral and dedicated it to the Immaculate Conception. Until the beginning of the 19th century it was a modest enclosure that was tried to turn into a building of great dimensions between 1805 and 1944, but the multiple earthquakes prevented that commitment. In 1945 the architect Manuel Mujica Millán designed a building according to the requirements of the city, which will be built for fifteen years by the brothers Pedro, Francisco and Víctor Colmenares. The new cathedral will be inaugurated in 1958 for the four hundred years of the city despite not being completed. The final works were directed by the architect Francisco J. Lluch. Since then it has become one of the most characteristic religious buildings in Venezuela.