Built between 1278 and 1363 upon the will of the Ghibelline Ubertino Landi, it is in Gothic Lombard style, with a terracotta façade.
The history of the Church of San Francesco
The Friars Minor built the church and the adjoining monastery. The monastery consisted of three cloisters with gardens.
During the Napoleonic period, the church remained almost always open, preserving its function, apart from a brief interlude in which it became first a warehouse and then a hospital.
After Napoleon’s exile it returned to the Friars; in 1848 Piacenza annexion to the Piedmont kingdom was declared here.
The architecture of San Francesco
Restored several times, San Francesco has similar characteristics to the basilica of the same name in Bologna, in which the influences of Burgundian Cistercian monastic architecture can be felt.
The façade has two buttresses, a rose window, spiree and pinnacles, a 15th century middle portal and, on both sides, two imposing flying buttresses. The cloister was on the right side: only an arcade has remained today.
