The convent was founded by the 7th Counts of Lemos, Don Pedro Fernández de Castro and Doña Catalina de la Cerda y Sandoval in 1622.

The convent is run by the Clarisas, masters of embroidery and excellent confectioners and liquor makers.

As it is a cloistered convent, most of its rooms are not open to visitors. The only rooms open to visitors are the Museum of Sacred Art and the church during worship hours. The current church is an extension of the original one built in the 20th century and features good stonework and Gothic details on doors and windows, as well as in the configuration of the presbytery.

The Museum of Sacred Art of the Clarisas is one of the most important in Spain in Sacred Art. It was inaugurated in 1977 after the renovation of the rooms that were formerly occupied by the convent’s infirmary. On the walls of the museum you can still see the cupboards in which medicines, sheets and other necessary instruments were kept.

Many of the pieces housed in the Convent were brought by the 7th Counts of Lemos from their viceroyalty in Naples at the beginning of the 17th century. Later, members of the family added other pieces. Its five rooms contain magnificent works of sculpture, painting, ivory, textiles and silverware. The most notable are from the workshop of the sculptor Gregorio Fernández, specifically the Immaculate Conception and the Recumbent Christ.