The Cathedral of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Soligalich was built in two stages with a long break. Construction began in the 1660s and was completed only over a hundred years later. The names of the architects have not survived, but it is known that the team from the second stage was likely from Ustyug. However, there are reasons to believe that the residents of Totma completed the construction. The start of the current building's construction is dated around 1668, thanks to the efforts of Tsarina Maria Ilyinichna from the Miloslavsky family.

In the 1660s, a women's Nativity Monastery was founded in Soligalich, which was supported by Tsarina Maria Ilyinichna. She spent part of her childhood at the Korcovo estate near Soligalich and donated significant sums to the monastery, allowing the construction of the stone cathedral to begin. After her death, funding from the royal treasury ceased, and the construction remained unfinished. Only the lower part of the temple and the tented bell tower were completed. In 1694, a chapel in honor of Abraham of Gorodets was arranged in the second tier of the bell tower. In 1764, after Catherine's secularization reform, the Nativity Monastery was abolished, and its unfinished church became a parish church and soon a city cathedral. Only in 1792 was construction resumed, according to one version, thanks to the initiative and contributions of F.I. Noshchokin, and according to another, the provincial architect Metlin.

Today, the Nativity Cathedral has been handed over to the diocese but remains closed. Services are not held there, and most relics have been lost. Only the magnificent baroque iconostasis and crumbling frescoes, telling the stories of the New and Old Testaments, have survived to this day.