Santa María la Blanca Church in Canillejas

The place of Canillejas, located northeast of Madrid, was located on the Camino Real de Aragón, the communication route that linked the Villa and Corte with the city of Alcalá de Henares. A small population that, however, acquired some notoriety for its abundant springs, orchards and gardens.

According to various opinions, this church could have a possible origin as a humiliator related to a nearby natural source and rest area for the journey, due to its location on the Camino Real de Aragón that connected Madrid with Alcalá de Henares and the great Europe. However, due to its characteristics, it seems to respond more to a hermitage structure fulfilling the functions of hermitage and church, assuming, therefore, the parochial functions.

There is a document that informs about the presence of Santa Teresa de Jesús in Canillejas on two occasions in the way of its foundations, which makes clear the importance of the place on the Camino Real.

Currently, the parish church of Santa María la Blanca is located in the Plaza de la Villa de Canillejas in Madrid, being the urban center of a neighborhood developed in the 60s of the twentieth century.

The whole set is unique in its style, since in Madrid the similar structures of contemporary buildings to the church of Santa María La Blanca have been lost, leaving some details but not spaces.

The highlighting of the armor by means of the finishing of the Italianized drawings of the sgraffito, denote the modernity and the European influence of the artisans and the care with which they worked in its construction and its possible relationship with the University of Alcalá and its founder, the Cardinal Cisneros. The presence of the Franciscan shield on the three sides of the border suggests their possible relationship.

It is a type of simple religious building, of Mudejar tradition, poor of materials and of rapid construction, executed with masonry or tapial between brick courses and wooden roofs with work carved in the beams.

It was built in two successive stages, with the head first, which would be built at the end of the XNUMXth century, and then the nave, during the XNUMXth century.

During the second third of the XNUMXth century, a hybrid architecture is developed in Castilla where several artistic trends are combined in the same building. Thus, the new Renaissance trends are added to the Gothic and Mudejar tradition, giving rise to a typological variety both structural and of plants as well as decorative.

One of the models, the simplest, is the one found in this church. It consists of a single nave with polygonal head and choir at the foot, a typology that is repeated frequently during the XNUMXth century following models of own plants from the end of the XNUMXth century, of which there are some examples in the Henares region (Perales from Tajuña, Los Hueros, Los Santos de la Humosa).

Generally their ships were covered with a type of deck based on the pair and knuckle armor with braces, in which characteristic elements of the Mudejar carpentry are maintained. However, in many cases the headers were covered with Gothic vaults, being few that are preserved with wooden armor (chapel of San Ildefonso at the University of Alcalá de Henares, around 1515).

In other cases, during the XNUMXth century, reforms or reconstructions are carried out in primitive temples, which in many occasions affected the ships, also covering themselves with wooden roofs of Mudejar tradition.

In both cases, these roofs are generally ochavadas, of pair and knuckle with braces on brackets, and diversity of decorative motifs, from the simplest to those of more complicated lacerías, as in the churches of Camarma de Esteruelas, Perales de Tajuña, Torres from Alameda, Valdilecha, Villalbilla, El Molar or Algete. However, this roof of Canillejas has the extraordinary interest of being one of the few examples that conserve the nave and headboard covered with loop carpentry made in the XNUMXth century, and the only one in the city of Madrid.

In the arrocabe, very developed, as well as in the two scallops of the head, classic decorative elements appear, such as contario, vegetal elements, dentellones, ovas, bay leaves, motifs that come from the classical world, which is also found in other roofs from the region such as Camarma de Esteruelas or the Paraninfo of the University of Alcalá.

In the roof of Canillejas, in addition, the decoration of loop of Mudejar tradition is combined with elements of the classic Renaissance repertoire. Under the arrocabe, the decoration of the headboard is completed with a frieze of sgraffito, which would cover the entire perimeter of the headboard, executed with the lime technique, a practice that arrived in Spain from Italy in the XNUMXth century and that ended up being imposed replacing the techniques of Muslim origin.

In 2018, it was proposed, from the General Directorate of Cultural Heritage, the realization of a Study of pathologies, with status report and proposed intervention in the presbytery of the church, after disassembling the plastered hurdle that covered the armor and that, ten years before, in tastings promoted by the Parish and directed by the architect Don Enrique Nuere Matauco, expert in this type of architectural elements, had been discovered.

This study and works consisted of: the removal of the covering hurdle, attachment of the almizate, overloaded in its trasdos with rubble, timely arrangement of meeting areas of the roof that produced humidities in the interior, data collection and tastings in the armor and the walls, drawing planes, etc.

From the result of this study and after verifying the precarious state in which the armor was, which should have been subject to the risk of sinking, the restoration of said armor and its contemporary and complementary element was proposed: a scribbled perimeter valance, with decoration to candelieri, which is under it, surrounding the perimeter of the Chapel.

Given the amount of the intervention and its urgency, the execution was considered to be included in the actions included in the Agreement with the Ecclesiastical Province for the year 2019.

As a complement to said intervention, given the finishes that existed and which were difficult to integrate into the final result due to non-professional actions and once the decision was made, in the drafting of the project, to recover the original state of the space, the recovery was considered of the interior walls of the chapel, contemporary with the trough and sgraffito. This last action was directly commissioned by the General Directorate of Cultural Heritage, running in parallel to the main work.

The archeology works, with findings that have conditioned the planned intervention, have allowed the recovery of the only original window and document the construction phases of the spaces of which the temple consists. The interior walls have been previously consolidated to their trim, plaster and paint.

The wooden armor, without polychrome, is of exceptional wealth in the carving of the couple and in the decoration with eight-pointed stars that are interwoven in the almizate. It has been necessary to disassemble an important part of its pieces due to the impact of the humidity of the roof, replacing some large elements for the support of the pairs, using prostheses to maintain the original pairs, highlighting parts and adjusting the assemblies of each one of the pairs and placing the missing carved pieces in the drawings. In the alicer, which borders the armor inferiorly, it has been necessary to strip the layers of paint with a scalpel to reach its original state. An antixylophagous treatment has been carried out and, finally, the wood has been toned to give uniformity to the whole.

The roof has been executed again, since the restoration has been carried out from both sides at the same time, solving the problems of leaks that existed between the two architectural spaces.

The recovery of the areas of the existing perimeter border and hidden under the plaster has been laborious because it has been necessary to consolidate, fill in the lost spaces, and clean the highlighted drawings.

The recovery of the unique and small original window, both inside and outside, has been able to be done by small remains found in the walls that indicated its size and flare, adding only a small window with the fleur de lis, symbol of the White Virgin

As a climax and to highlight the whole, a new lighting has been installed that highlights and allows the contemplation of the entire space and of the architectural, decorative or liturgical elements.

• Investment

The total cost of the unique recovery of all this unique space in Madrid has been, from its previous studies to its value with the conclusion of the work, of 375.928,54 euros.

• Board Characteristics

The works have been carried out by the company Acerouno Restauración Inteligente SL and directed by the architect Ignacio de la Vega and the technical architect Javier Grande.