Santa Maria Regina Angelorum is a later 20th century school chapel located at Via dei Georgofili 39 in the suburb of Tor Marancia, east of Garbatella. This is in the Ardeatino quarter.
The dedication is to the Blessed Virgin Mary, under her title of "Queen of Angels".
History
The Suore Francescane Dell’Immacolata ("Franciscan Sisters of the Immaculate") built a large convent complex with a school when the suburb was first laid out. They moved in in 1961.
There are several congregations of sisters with the same or a very similar name. This one was founded at San Piero a Ponte near Florence in 1874, and has its headquarters in the latter city. The Regina Angelorum convent is its only one in Rome, and in 2017 had four sisters in residence (according to the Diocese).
The chapel is dependent on the parish of Nostra Signora di Lourdes a Tor Marancia , but remains private with no public liturgies being advertised.
The school, for smaller children, is apparently flourishing.
Exterior
Layout and fabric
The convent and school occupy a single massive edifice, of four storeys in arranged around a completely enclosed little courtyard garden. The chapel is the size of a church, and occupies the north-west range parallel to the Via dell'Arcadia.
The range incorporating the chapel has four storeys, including a crypt below street level and an attic. The actual chapel is in the middle two storeys, which are in pink brick for the side street frontage. It has an entrance bay including a loggia, a single nave of eight bays, and a narrower sanctuary of one bay. The attic above the church does not extend over the entrance bay, which has its own lower gabled and tiled roof.
The first chapel storey has a round-headed window in each bay, apart from the first two. The second to seventh bays have the side wall thickened -the reason for this can be seen inside. The second chapel storey has a vertical rectangular window in each bay, except for the first.
Façade
The chapel has an architecturally distinct neo-Romanesque façade in pink brick at the end of the range that it occupies. The internal loggia is entered by three quadrangular portals, the middle one square and the outer pair vertically rectangular. These are separated by brick piers. Above the entrances is a horizontal floating canopy. The rest of the frontage is plain, except for two round-headed windows above the side entrances and a round window at gable level.
Campanile
A campanile protrudes above the roof on the left hand side, being in the form of a tall rectangular plinth with a central section in concrete and two side ones as brick pilasters. These latter extend higher to form two brick piers with sideways sloping tops, and in the gap thus created is a vertical lenticular wire frame in which is hung a single bell.
Interior
The interior has a single nave with a separate sanctuary. The nave walls have a high greenish-grey dado, but are otherwise in a very pale salmon-pink. The completely blank flat ceiling is in white, with a cornice in the grey.
The same grey colour is used for six arched recesses on each side, each of these containing a window except for the next to last on the right hand side which has a side entrance from the convent courtyard. All but one of these recesses are quite deep, which is why the walling around them is thick. Very oddly, the far left recess is much less deep -was a public entrance originally envisaged? The arches have no imposts, but are edged with continuous roll-molding.
The windows have decorative glasswork with panes in triangles set in lead, and each has a stained glass lozenge in its centre depicting a Christian symbol.
Sanctuary
The sanctuary apse has a pair of round-headed side windows matching those of the nave. The altar has been brought forward into the last bay of the nave, and stands on a raised platform of two steps which is a continuation of the apse floor. The tabernacle has been left on the far wall, and above is a round window with a stained glass depiction of Our Lady. This is surrounded by a sculpture in the form of a ribbon springing from the tabernacle and twisting around the window to give a cross motif.