The church was built to house the dynastic pantheon of Queen Isabella the Catholic, dedicated to St. John the Evangelist, which was devoted queen. The fate of the building dictates the way you catafalco simulated, surrounded by pinnacles as candles.
What trace rose and the head of the church and the cruise John Guaso, the first to hold the title of royal architect. For the entire facade runs the cord of the Franciscan order which occupies the building. The header is polygonal with buttresses crowned with needles or pinnacles, decorated with kings of arms, heralds a natural size, that look in their dress shields of the Catholic Monarchs. The cimborio on the cruise is octagonal, crowned with crest and decorated with more Gothic pinnacles. On the home side there is a unique Calvary, where this is the Virgin and St. John, but not Christ. This is symbolized by the pelican who poses on the cross, in keeping with the medieval belief that the bird was able to feed their children with their own blood, being a sort of prefiguration of the Eucharist.
The Catholic Monarchs in thanksgiving for victory in the battle of Toro, decided to build a temple votivo at the same time have a pantheon of regional trade and agreed that the foundation took place in Toledo. The second of the reasons (the conquest of grenade) was not achieved but the temple was erected likewise finished in the year 1495. The queen had the hope that the work would serve as royal pantheon. Discard the idea, decided to use the new building to house the Franciscan brothers, who had come to them seeking their help.
The construction of the temple was entrusted to architect John Guaso Yale Egas CUEM sculptor, whose decoration will be decisive in the decoration. To cover these large sums of money for works using the real treasures. The church has a single nave and several side chapels. Stresses in its internal distribution of the exquisite light, with a maximum brightness on the altar, achieved thanks to a special arrangement of windows, as well as the distribution of spaces. The faculty dedicated to God, St. John the Evangelist and San Francisco, is regarded as one of the jewels of late Gothic Hispanic. In time of Charles V was built one second faculty communicated with him on a ladder.
In the austere exterior, some chains hung from the parameters of the apse of the cruise, which were mandated by hanging Queen Elizabeth, reminiscent of the reconquest of territory south of the peninsula at the hands of King Ferdinand, who liberated them to the Christian captives. The church plant has a spacious lounge with cruise to accommodate future burial mounds. The header is polygonal, forming a veritable tapestry sculptural resonance Mudejar. It was covered with a vault of eight-pointed stars and relies on tubes. The cruise ship can be seen in the decoration also epigráfica, also of the Mudejar tradition, these signs alluding to the conquest of Granada.The entry was designed by the end of the foot of the church choir with the high, leading to the nave altar, according grows lighting spaces. Repeated real shields in the chapel were made before 1492, since it does not appear in them the fruit of the pomegranate, symbol of the kingdom then conquered. All the decoration is repetitive and designed to highlight the magnificence of kings. Isabel is symbolized by bundles of arrows that represent the joining of forces and the "Y" initial of his name in the script of the time.
 
Fernando is symbolized by the "F" and by the yoke with the slogan "both mounts," which refers to the episode of the legendary Gordian knot, cut by Alexander the Great, given the impossibility of unleashed. It is a justification of the means used to achieve the purpose intended. This indicates the primacy of national interest on other considerations, the very thought of Machiavelli. It is no coincidence that the symbols of each of the spouses begin with the initial name of another.
Another key area is the faculty and dual-square floor, one of the masterpieces of Gothic end, a Spanish flamenco aesthetics, which combines elements Mudejar and Gothic, very own John Guasa. The length of its sides with five vain is just half of the nave of the church. The faculty is covered with low rib vault-type German, without which the nerves come together at the center, hence, without key.
The senior faculty presents a coffered wood with the typical Lac Mudejar. Columns, arches and pillars are covered with plant motifs and animals, many of them also equipped with symbolism. Among them are human figures, isolated or forming scenes, like a child stabbing an eagle, a monkey riding a dog playing the flute, another sitting on a urinal and many more, own repertoire of Gothic taste. Although some may come from the restoration of the nineteenth century. For all the faculty are scattered sculptures of biblical characters on bases and under doseletes. The staircase leading to high faculty and presents reasons Renaissance, a vault half orange, masks, Venero, coffered, samples of work by Alonso de Covarrubias.
Attention is drawn chains hung in the exterior walls of the church. They correspond to the captives freed in the long campaign of Grenada and was hung in 1494, and ex-vote and symbol of the triumph of the Christian faith. Rounding out the well-intentioned decoration of the building.
Finally the Kings changed their minds after the conquest of Grenada and its postrer abode is in the new cathedral of that capital.
The convent was virtually destroyed in the War of Independence and was rebuilt only partially, the second faculty disappearing, according to the criteria historicist nineteenth century, while distinction between old and restored, being the best example of the gargoyles faculty.
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