Monasteries

St. Andrew the First-Called Church (Blue Monastery)

25, Leo Kiacheli Street, Vera, Mtatsminda District, Tbilisi, 0108, Georgia

Building type: Cross-dome church

Tbilisi Region

Frescoes

Architectural Details

Region

Tbilisi

Category

Monasteries

History

The Blue Monastery is one of the significant medieval monuments of Tbilisi. The church was built on the site of an earlier church at the end of the 12th or beginning of the 13th century. According to the inscription preserved above the southern entrance, its builder was Basil, a former Archbishop of Kartli and brother of Abulasan. Originally, the church was a domed church dedicated to Saint Andrew the First-Called.

The church came to be known as the “Blue Monastery” because of its roof covered with blue-glazed tiles. The church was severely damaged in the 16th - 17th centuries and was subsequently restored. In the 19th century, during the period of Russian rule, the building housed a gunpowder depot of the Russian army. Between 1871 and 1873, the church underwent restoration, and in 1873 a new dome and bell tower were added.

During the Soviet period, a sawmill was established in the Blue Monastery building in the 1950s. Later, the building housed the Museum of the History of Georgian Medicine. In 1990, religious services resumed at the church.

Unfortunately, the church’s original wall paintings have not survived. No traces of the earlier paintings are visible in the interior today, while the existing wall paintings are of more recent date.

Historical Sources