Castro was inaugurated in 1552 by Archbishop Jerónimo de Loayza. This was a small building -9 x 19 m.-, very modest and narrow, and for its foundations reddish stone was brought from a quarry in Lunahuaná. The new cathedral later had Saint John the Evangelist as its patron saint. A large cathedral Later, when the city of Lima became an Archbishopric, the construction of a new cathedral was considered in accordance with the rise in status of the episcopate of Lima, as well as with its population growth. In 1564 Archbishop Jerónimo de Loayza decided on a sumptuous building to rival the most famous cathedrals in Spain (such as Seville Cathedral then, and now the largest in Spain), thus beginning a change in dimensions. The work began with the demolition of the primitive adobe walls, but the new construction would not be completed. Master builder Alonso Gonzales Beltrán was given the task, in 1564, of designing a large church with three naves and side chapels. But his project, inspired by the Seville Cathedral, turned out to be too grandiose and costly. When Viceroy Martín Enríquez de Almanza arrived, in 1581, being Archbishop of Lima Toribio de Mogrovejo, arranged for a new cathedral to be built and in 1585 the Trujilloan architect Francisco Becerra, who had made plans for several buildings in Mexico and Quito, was called from Cusco, where, at the time, he was working, and was in charge of the construction of the third cathedral. Becerra made a new plan (considered to be the plan on which the existing cathedral is based) that took, in part, the cathedrals of Jaén and Seville as models. The first had three naves, like the one in Lima, the second had five, but there are doors in the arms of the crossing, three doors in the main façade and a side courtyard called, as in the Cathedral of Lima, the Patio de los Naranjos, which is reached through the side door that is to the left. The definitive layout of the cathedral, made by Becerra, resulted in a Renaissance-style church, with a wide floor plan and 3 large naves and two side chapels. In 1602, the church was still "an old shack-type, covered with straw with much indecency" according to a letter that Philip III of Spain sent to Archbishop Toribio de Mogrovejo in which he urged him to hurry up with the