In the seventeenth century the building was the headquarters of the province of San Francisco de Zacatecas.
Since 1953 there was the concern to rescue the monument, and it was until 1980 when, in an effort to turn the building into a museum, a limited reconstruction was carried out. This priceless venue is one of the most beautiful in the country and unique in its kind for the quality of its collection. The invaluable donation of the Zacatecan painter Rafael Coronel and his son, Juan Coronel Rivera, is made up of "The Face of Mexico", 10,000 Mexican masks used in dances and ritual ceremonies throughout the country; "In Colonial Times", a collection of a thousand terracottas from the 17th and 18th centuries; "La sala de la olla" is another unique sample of a great variety of pre-Hispanic vessels; “Las tandas de Rosete” exhibits a collection of puppets from the 19th and early 20th centuries; in addition, of course works by Rafael Coronel himself are exhibited.
