The chapel stands just outside the old centre of Caselle, in the Madonnina district, along the road that linked Turin with the Lanzo valleys. Inside it keeps a votive pillar that local tradition dates to the fifteenth century, once known as the Pillon de Ross: the chapel was built around that pillar after a resolution of the Caselle town council established its construction in 1649, and the work was carried out between 1658 and 1660.
What to see
The pillar stayed where it was, in the middle of the hall, and the chapel grew around it: that is what strikes you most on entering. On the pillar are Saint Francis and a Crucifixion, along with the figure of a bishop; on the three outer faces you see the Madonna nursing the Child between Saints John the Baptist and Benedict of Nursia, then Saint Sebastian, Saint Anthony Abbot and Saint Christopher, and an Annunciation. The walls of the hall carry a cycle probably made in the eighteenth century, with the Massacre of the Innocents, the Ascent to the Cross, the Crucifixion and the Deposition. An ex voto dated 1708 is also preserved, recording the passage of French troops.
Visiting
The facade is plain, framed by pilaster strips, and the interior is a single rectangular hall: from outside it promises nothing, and it is exactly the kind of building that surprises whoever steps in. The chapel opens occasionally and can be visited by appointment.
Our editors' tip
It is worth walking there from the centre. The isolated position is no accident: the pillar stood on an obligatory passage, and for centuries anyone heading for the valleys stopped here a moment. That is the same reason the chapel is full of paintings and has no facade to show off: what counted was what was inside.