La guía de Teresa
Barrios
BARRIO DE LAS LETRAS, one of the most attractive and exciting areas of Madrid.
Bounded by the Paseo del Prado, Calle Atocha, Carrera de San Jerónimo and Calle Carretas, it is a challenge to our perceptions. At every step or movement we should be careful not to be overlooked by countless historical and literary winks that appear to us. Whether in the form of informational plaques or inscriptions on the ground, one gets transported without too much effort to another era.
Letras is possibly the best preserved historic neighborhood in Madrid. To get an idea of how this district became what it is today, we need to go back to the 17th century when the area was a poor neighborhood on the outskirts of Madrid. It no doubt made a striking contrast with the courtiers' district just north, around Carrera San Jerónimo, that is where aristocrats enjoyed hunting, dancing and drinking chocolate in their recreational villas.
Specifically the Spanish Golden Age, the seventeenth century, Cervantes, Quevedo, Lope de Vega and Góngora walked and lived in these narrow streets. Their skills in the literary arts excelled in a neighbourhood with an enormous social life, where there were popular comedy theatres and ‘mentideros’. In a society much given to gossip, the intelligence of these brilliant authors, pen in hand, gave to this neighborhood a bohemian air that is still present nowadays. There was some serious partying going on, and it often started out at the mentidero on Leon street, a popular artists' hangout. And, since the writers loved nothing better than to bad-mouth each other,these cobble-stoned streets have witnessed all sort of drama.
Miguel de Cervantes, author of Don Quixote, lived in four different houses in this neighborhood and died on León street on a house that has been demolished, but a commemorative plaque marks the site. Several other plaques pay tribute to him, including one on Atocha street where the printer that published Don Quixote still stands, and another on the Convent of the Trinitarias, where the author was buried.
A neighborhood whose current existence turns around the delicious Plaza de Santa Ana, with its terraces, its elegant hotel Victoria (now ME) front, the Teatro Español and the monuments of Calderón de la Barca and Garcia Lorca.
Calle Príncipe links two of the most beautiful squares of Madrid, Plaza de Canalejas and Plaza de Santa Ana with two exquisite venues that hold loosely over the years. Calle Principe is forever destined to join a path full of history, a delightful walk, this century-old street has seen the Barrio de las Letras and Madrid’s swordsmen and writers’ society flourishing and becoming one of the most elegant and liveliest street of the Court. In fact, it held the Corral del Principe and the Corral de la Pacheca, where nowadays is the Teatro Español. Both were authentic social hotbeds of that time
Continuing the walk along Plaza Santa Ana to Plaza del Angel in San Sebastián 2 street we find the Palace of the count of Tepa. I find it a curious but unknown place because it shows spectacular remains of the ‘Viaje de Agua de La Castellana”.
The Palace was built in the late eighteenth century and early nineteenth, stone and brick around two courtyards, in Neoclassical style. It has recently been converted into a luxurious five-star hotel. It was during its rehabilitation that the relevant archaeological work was carried out. It has been a pleasant surprise to discover the existence of these remains under the foundations of the old palace and how they have been preserved in the new hotel under a glass floor on which we walk and contemplate all found elements (just behind the hotel reception).
Since the founding of Madrid in the second half of the ninth century until 1851 when the supply water of the Lozoya River was inaugurated by the Canal de Isabel II, the town was supplied through a network of underground galleries called ‘qanats’ or ‘viajes de agua’ (water trips), of Arab origin, which provided captured groundwater. A perfect network that improved and spread as the same time as the city and its needs.
The name derives from the Arabic Mayrit (later Madrid) "where the mayra (water pipes) abound" reflecting the importance of these systems had since the founding of the city and some have been preserved to this day.
San Sebastian’s church, is a national monument, not with treasured works of art, but for its impressive archive because it was the church where all Barrio de las Letras writers, composers and artists were members of its brotherhood.
In the old church cemetery were buried famous writers such as Lope de Vega (there is a plaque inside the church that remembers it)
It is known as "comedian graveyard". Closed the cemetery and transferred the bodies to the church In 1889, a current flower garden was created. It is a place of great charm carefully preserved with ancient gates of fine iron columns and glass, with wooden roof, an original source, ‘El jardín del angel’ now is a flower’s shop that emanates certain magical charm.
Matute square more like a short street or passage, in number 10 we find a real jewel, a cozy modernist building where all eyes turn, Pérez Villamil built it between 1906 and 1908, is the house with a rounded facade pristine lines and arabesques and a portal with lanterns and railings. This style flourished in the beginning of the XX century and it is connected to the development of the cities and the middle class. Innovative materials of this style were iron and glass. It wants to remind us of nature and therefore we find many plants and flowers in the decoration of the buildings. It was important that the different buildings could be distinguished by its original decorations. There are not many modernist buildings In Madrid, just a very few, Longoria Palace is the most notable example of modernist architecture in Madrid, it is located in Chueca neighbourhood. In contrast to Madrid, Barcelona offers beautiful examples of this type of architecture.
85 yerel halk öneriyor
Barrio de Las Letras
BARRIO DE LAS LETRAS, one of the most attractive and exciting areas of Madrid.
Bounded by the Paseo del Prado, Calle Atocha, Carrera de San Jerónimo and Calle Carretas, it is a challenge to our perceptions. At every step or movement we should be careful not to be overlooked by countless historical and literary winks that appear to us. Whether in the form of informational plaques or inscriptions on the ground, one gets transported without too much effort to another era.
Letras is possibly the best preserved historic neighborhood in Madrid. To get an idea of how this district became what it is today, we need to go back to the 17th century when the area was a poor neighborhood on the outskirts of Madrid. It no doubt made a striking contrast with the courtiers' district just north, around Carrera San Jerónimo, that is where aristocrats enjoyed hunting, dancing and drinking chocolate in their recreational villas.
Specifically the Spanish Golden Age, the seventeenth century, Cervantes, Quevedo, Lope de Vega and Góngora walked and lived in these narrow streets. Their skills in the literary arts excelled in a neighbourhood with an enormous social life, where there were popular comedy theatres and ‘mentideros’. In a society much given to gossip, the intelligence of these brilliant authors, pen in hand, gave to this neighborhood a bohemian air that is still present nowadays. There was some serious partying going on, and it often started out at the mentidero on Leon street, a popular artists' hangout. And, since the writers loved nothing better than to bad-mouth each other,these cobble-stoned streets have witnessed all sort of drama.
Miguel de Cervantes, author of Don Quixote, lived in four different houses in this neighborhood and died on León street on a house that has been demolished, but a commemorative plaque marks the site. Several other plaques pay tribute to him, including one on Atocha street where the printer that published Don Quixote still stands, and another on the Convent of the Trinitarias, where the author was buried.
A neighborhood whose current existence turns around the delicious Plaza de Santa Ana, with its terraces, its elegant hotel Victoria (now ME) front, the Teatro Español and the monuments of Calderón de la Barca and Garcia Lorca.
Calle Príncipe links two of the most beautiful squares of Madrid, Plaza de Canalejas and Plaza de Santa Ana with two exquisite venues that hold loosely over the years. Calle Principe is forever destined to join a path full of history, a delightful walk, this century-old street has seen the Barrio de las Letras and Madrid’s swordsmen and writers’ society flourishing and becoming one of the most elegant and liveliest street of the Court. In fact, it held the Corral del Principe and the Corral de la Pacheca, where nowadays is the Teatro Español. Both were authentic social hotbeds of that time
Continuing the walk along Plaza Santa Ana to Plaza del Angel in San Sebastián 2 street we find the Palace of the count of Tepa. I find it a curious but unknown place because it shows spectacular remains of the ‘Viaje de Agua de La Castellana”.
The Palace was built in the late eighteenth century and early nineteenth, stone and brick around two courtyards, in Neoclassical style. It has recently been converted into a luxurious five-star hotel. It was during its rehabilitation that the relevant archaeological work was carried out. It has been a pleasant surprise to discover the existence of these remains under the foundations of the old palace and how they have been preserved in the new hotel under a glass floor on which we walk and contemplate all found elements (just behind the hotel reception).
Since the founding of Madrid in the second half of the ninth century until 1851 when the supply water of the Lozoya River was inaugurated by the Canal de Isabel II, the town was supplied through a network of underground galleries called ‘qanats’ or ‘viajes de agua’ (water trips), of Arab origin, which provided captured groundwater. A perfect network that improved and spread as the same time as the city and its needs.
The name derives from the Arabic Mayrit (later Madrid) "where the mayra (water pipes) abound" reflecting the importance of these systems had since the founding of the city and some have been preserved to this day.
San Sebastian’s church, is a national monument, not with treasured works of art, but for its impressive archive because it was the church where all Barrio de las Letras writers, composers and artists were members of its brotherhood.
In the old church cemetery were buried famous writers such as Lope de Vega (there is a plaque inside the church that remembers it)
It is known as "comedian graveyard". Closed the cemetery and transferred the bodies to the church In 1889, a current flower garden was created. It is a place of great charm carefully preserved with ancient gates of fine iron columns and glass, with wooden roof, an original source, ‘El jardín del angel’ now is a flower’s shop that emanates certain magical charm.
Matute square more like a short street or passage, in number 10 we find a real jewel, a cozy modernist building where all eyes turn, Pérez Villamil built it between 1906 and 1908, is the house with a rounded facade pristine lines and arabesques and a portal with lanterns and railings. This style flourished in the beginning of the XX century and it is connected to the development of the cities and the middle class. Innovative materials of this style were iron and glass. It wants to remind us of nature and therefore we find many plants and flowers in the decoration of the buildings. It was important that the different buildings could be distinguished by its original decorations. There are not many modernist buildings In Madrid, just a very few, Longoria Palace is the most notable example of modernist architecture in Madrid, it is located in Chueca neighbourhood. In contrast to Madrid, Barcelona offers beautiful examples of this type of architecture.