Sant’Ignazio, Rome

Sant'Ignazio, Rome tickets: which one to buy

Sant'Ignazio is free, open through the day and five minutes from the Pantheon, which makes it one of the easiest stops in Rome. The thing to know is that a mirror stands in the nave, angled so that you can look at the ceiling without tipping your head back, and a marked disc on the floor shows where to stand for the trick of the false dome to work properly.

Guided tours of baroque Rome include this church with the Gesu, Sant'Andrea al Quirinale and San Luigi dei Francesi, and that circuit is the best single day for anyone interested in the period. Evening concerts are held here occasionally and are ticketed. The square outside, laid out in the eighteenth century like a small stage set of curved house fronts, is worth a look in its own right. Nothing needs booking. A second mirror stands near the transept and is usually free when the first has a queue.

Visiting Sant'Ignazio, Rome: what to see

The church was built between 1626 and 1650 as the chapel of the Roman College, the Jesuit university, and it was designed to preach. Money ran out before the dome could be built over the crossing, so Andrea Pozzo, a Jesuit lay brother and the leading illusionist painter of the age, painted one instead: a flat canvas some seventeen metres across that, seen from the right spot, reads as a coffered dome rising into the sky. Walk a few steps and the whole thing skews.

Pozzo also painted the nave vault, showing the missionary work of the Jesuits carried up into heaven, with the architecture of the church apparently continuing upward for another storey before dissolving; the figures at the edges lean out over a painted cornice. It is the most complete surviving demonstration of baroque perspective painting anywhere, and it was made by a man who wrote the textbook on the subject. Four large side altars carry gilded urns holding the remains of Jesuit saints, including Aloysius Gonzaga.

Sant'Ignazio, Rome opening hours and the best time to go

The church closes for a couple of hours at midday and opens into the early evening. The ceiling needs light and is best in the middle of the day, which is exactly when the church shuts, so aim for late morning or the first hour after reopening. Crowds are moderate compared with the Pantheon and concentrate around the mirror. Evening is atmospheric, with the vault lit artificially and far fewer people.

Rome in August is hot and half the restaurants close; spring and late autumn are the good seasons. The square outside is quiet at night and the streets around it hold some of the oldest cafes in the city. Allow half an hour, and spend most of it standing on the marked disc rather than walking about. The false dome was repainted on canvas in the nineteenth century after the original was damaged.