Varaždin Cathedral, which is one of the most significant early Baroque sacral buildings in northern Croatia, was built by the Jesuits from 1642 to 1646. The Jesuits, who played an important role in the Catholic Counter-Reformation in the 16th and 17th century, settled in Varaždin in 1632 and they opened a grammar school the following year. The Church was designed and built by a Jesuit Juraj Matota and the building was financed by Count Gašpar Drašković. It is an early Baroque single-nave church with six side chapels above which there are two galleries. A sacristy, which was finished and decorated in 1656, got its final form in 1726, when it was rebuilt. A church bell with its corner pilasters, which was finished in 1676, was an innovation which wasn`t widely accepted until the 18th century.
Its portal is considered to have been the most stylistically advanced in Croatia in the 17th century. Three-quarter half-pillars, which are placed on high bases, carry a gable which is opened towards an ornamented niche in which a statue of Virgin Mary is placed on a volute base. At its foot there is a beam on which a family coat of arms of the Drašković family is hanging on an iron hook. Together with Count Gašpar they were the main benefactors of the Church.
