Our Lady of Loreto

The Basilica della Santa Casa (English: Basilica of the Holy House) is a shrine of Marian pilgrimage in Loreto, Italy. The basilica is known for enshrining the house in which the Blessed Virgin Mary is believed to have lived. Pious devotees believe that the same house was flown over by Angelic beings from Jerusalem to Tersatto then to Recanati before arriving at the current site.

Pope Benedict XV designated the Blessed Virgin Mary under the same title to be Patroness of air passengers and auspicious travel on 24 March 1920. Accordingly, Pope Pius XI granted a Canonical Coronation to the image of Our Lady of Loreto made of Cedar of Lebanon on 5 September 1922, replacing the torched image consumed in fire on 23 February 1921.

The basilica is a Late Gothic structure continued by Giuliano da Maiano, Giuliano da Sangallo and Donato Bramante. It is 93 meters long, 60 meters wide, and its campanile is 75.6 meters high.

The façade of the church was erected under Sixtus V, who fortified Loreto and gave it the privileges of a town (1586); his colossal statue stands in the middle of front steps. Over the principal doorway is a life-size bronze statue of the Virgin and Child by Girolamo Lombardo; the three superb bronze doors executed at the latter end of the 16th century and under Paul V (1605–1621) are also by Lombardo, his sons and his pupils, among them Tiburzio Vergelli, who also made the fine bronze font in the interior. The doors and hanging lamps of the Santa Casa are by the same artists.

...
Wikipedia