The Metropolitan Seminary building is a baroque palace in Turin, which was built to house the seminary of the archdiocese and later was the seat of the Pontifical Theological Faculty of Turin and today the seat of the separate section of the Theological Faculty of Northern Italy.

The 1711 project (previously attributed to Filippo Juvara) is recognized as the work of Pietro Paolo Cerruti. Completion took place between 1738 and 1729 with the construction of the wing towards Via Cappel Verde. The construction of the palace is part of the expansion of the city in the years 1720-30 (third expansion of Turin) and the urban planning revolution promoted by Vittorio Amedeo II and led by Filippo Juvarra after Turin became the capital of the Kingdom of Sardinia. "Kingdom of Sardinia (1720-1861)").[1]​

Given the small size of the seminary at that time, in 1711 it was decided to build a new building (the current one) on the same site as the previous one. The work was directed by the rector of the seminary, Pietro Cossa. Cossa (Usseglio February 13, 1672 – November 29, 1760) was rector from 1704 until his death, and was also canon theologian of the Metropolitan Chapter of Turin, director of a Moral Theology Conference for the clergy, abbot of the Abbey of San Costanzo. in Villar San Constancio, confessor of Queen Ana María de Borbón-Orleáns and Carlos Manuel III. Above the central door of the seminar room a bust and a plaque are dedicated to him.[2]​.

The construction of the palace was long and complex, accompanied by purchases, adaptations and demolitions of buildings on the block. [2] [3] The first half of the building was completed between 1711 and 1713; Between 1722 and 1723 the east and north wings were built and more than a third of the building still had to be built. In the contract of March 10, 1711, the stonemasons Bartolomeo Quadrone and Francesco Busso had been hired to build the central portal with Gassino stone. The master builders Domenico and Carlo Francesco Pizone worked on the eastern wing between 1711 and 1712.[2] In August 1712, fourteen (out of twenty-four) large red marble columns (with capitals, plinths and ornaments) by the Milanese stonemasons Antonio Magistretto and Carlo Salvadore were delivered by river in 150 ships, leaving from Bereguardo. In 1723-24 the masons of Barge were given the task of working the floors with local stone. Costa obtained significant financial funds, including through loans contracted between 1713 and 1749. In 1734 Cossa donated his own money for further expansion, the construction of a chapel and the creation of free places for poor priests. On January 20, 1728, the archbishop of Gattinara, Mons. Francesco Giuseppe Arborio, confirmed that the palace was half finished. At that time the community had 42 clerics, some of whom studied grammar and rhetoric at the Jesuit college, others philosophy and theology at the university. Between the years 1728 and 1733, the chapel and the western wing of the seminary building were completed.[2] The south wing was completed in the years 1778-1780 under the direction of the architect Carlo Ceroni, originally from Val Solda, after the demolition of the old houses. At the time of its completion, the rector was Giovanni Tommaso Adami and Archbishop Vittorio Costa d'Arignano.[3] In April 1782 the clockmaker Pietro Martina installed a large clock in the courtyard. In 1793 the rector Adami began the expansion of the chapel, commissioning the Genoese master stonemason Francesco Parodi to make a new marble altar and the wooden choir to the carpenter Vincenzo Rasario of Romagnano Sesia. The fact is that the construction of the western wing, of which the chapel is part, is the least clearly documented.[3]​It was occupied by French troops in 1799. The seminary, the university and the theology faculty were suspended by the Revolution.[3]​ Archbishop Giacinto Della Torre, who enjoyed the sympathy of the Napoleonic regime, obtained with imperial decree the reopening of the seminary on February 16, 1807. Important and expensive repairs to make it habitable, also because the movable property had been looted by the French and handed over to the public domain. For many years after 1848 it was used as a temporary military hospital; In 1867 it was confiscated by the Italian state. During World War II it was damaged by bombings that damaged the southwestern part.[4]​.