Clerigos Church and Tower

Clerigos Church and Tower tickets: which one to buy

One ticket covers the church, the museum in the brotherhood's old rooms and the tower, and it is timed, with numbers capped on the staircase; book online in summer because the queue on the steps outside is long and shadeless. A night ticket for the last slots of the day costs a little more and puts you on the tower with the city lit. The church alone is free during mass. Guided walking tours of Porto include the site and cost several times the ticket.

The tower is 75 metres and 240 steps up a tight spiral that is two-way near the top, with no lift; it is not suitable for anyone with limited mobility or serious claustrophobia. The museum is included and most visitors walk straight through it towards the stairs. The ticket includes a small exhibition of sacred art and a viewing room over the nave, both of which are skipped by almost everyone.

Visiting Clerigos Church and Tower: what to see

The Brotherhood of the Clergy commissioned the church from Nicolau Nasoni, an Italian painter and architect who came to Porto to decorate the cathedral and stayed for the rest of his life. He built it between 1732 and 1750 on an elliptical plan, the first baroque church in Portugal to use one, with a facade of garlands, shells and a broken pediment adapted from Roman models. The tower followed between 1754 and 1763 and became the symbol of the city, visible from the river, the bridges and half the streets in the centre.

Nasoni designed it in six diminishing storeys and was buried in the church's crypt, without a marked grave, at his own request. From the top the view runs over the tiled roofs to the Douro, the port lodges of Gaia and the sea. The altarpiece of the main chapel is polychrome marble by Manuel dos Santos Porto, and the church's oval plan makes the interior feel far larger than the footprint suggests.

Clerigos Church and Tower opening hours and the best time to go

Open daily from morning to late evening, with the last tower slot about half an hour before closing; night visits run in summer. The stairs are hot in July and August and the top is windy year-round. Sunset is the popular slot and sells out first. Porto is rainy from October to April and the tower closes in storms. The church is small and takes ten minutes; the tower with the queue takes an hour.

Dress modestly for the church. Photography is allowed throughout. The Lello bookshop, the Carmo church with its tiled wall and the Sao Bento station are all within five minutes, which makes this the densest corner of the city for visitors. The Clerigos gardens beside the tower are a small public park and the best place to photograph the building from below.