Parroquia de Nuestra Señora de la Asunción (Parish of Our Lady of the Assumption)

Rising above the surrounding skyline, the futuristic green dome of Parroquia de Nuestra Señora de la Asunción in Huauchinango, Mexico, is an unforgettable piece of devotional architecture.

Puebla’s Northern Sierra region has long been a particular stronghold of Catholicism in Mexico. Well before the 2011 establishment of one of the most-recent pilgrimage sites in the country in Xicotepec, the nearby city of Huauchinango was the site of another monumental Catholic work. On December 14, 1947, construction began on the church that would eventually be known as La Parroquia de Nuestra Señora de la Asunción.

Overseen by architect Carlos Lazo Barreiro and engineer Leopoldo Lieberman during its construction, the modernist design of this building stands out thanks to the massive green dome crowning it. The dome has a diameter of around 88 feet (27 meters) and a height of 49 feet (15 meters), leading to claims about its size relative to other domed structures varying greatly. The constant seems to place it in the top five largest domes in Latin America.

While construction was relatively uninterrupted and the building concluded a couple of years later, it wouldn’t be until 1975 that the church would finally be consecrated by a representative of the Holy See. Consecrated to Our Lady of the Assumption, the church features an effigy of this virgin in its central altar. Surrounding it are several walls with murals that depict Christian imagery, divided by columns that depict the local Northern Sierra flora and fauna.