Go ahead, it's open. During only 48 hours, the Open House festival allows free entry in some of the jewels of Madrid's architecture, normally closed to the public. More than a hundred emblematic buildings and public spaces they will cease to be impregnable during the last weekend of September. The initiative was born in London more than 20 years ago and it has spread to 30 other cities: Rome, New York, Barcelona... But let's say I'm talking about Madrid: these are the essential visits. Sign up quickly because the places fly.
Master Oíza
To that Iberian genius that was Francisco Javier Saenz de Oiza this edition is dedicated. The architect of some of the greatest landmarks of Spanish architecture (such as the Torres Blancas) deserves a quiet visit to the Castellana 81 complex, which has just been rehabilitated, recovering the sensations of amazement and vertigo that it provoked in the Spain that woke up from Francoism the then Torre BBVA.
New generations
As soon as you have studied History, surely the Free Institution of Education, that frustrated Spanish educational dream without books or exams, based on the love of nature and human curiosity, which was going to create critical and free thinking. The headquarters of the Institution, called since the death of its great promoter Giner de los Rios Foundation, was completely renovated a couple of years ago by the architectural duo AMID.zero9. 21st century materials and techniques to preserve a beautiful 19th century ideal. Spectacular and a little sidereal, the headquarters of Paseo del General Martínez Campo can be visited and understood after registration.
Palace's things
If for a moment you have thought that the building on these lines is the Palace of Communications (Cibeles) you were wrong, but not misguided. The architect Antonio Palacios is the genius behind both constructions . Together with Joaquín Otamendi, Palacios gave Madrid u a sophisticated and cosmopolitan grandeur that the capital would not have been able to dream of at the beginning of the 20th century. But back to the building in the image: the Hospital de Jornaleros de San Francisco de Paula aka Hospital de Maudes, today headquarters of the Ministry of Transport, Housing and Infrastructure. of the Community of Madrid. A National Monument that was born from philanthropy: Dolores Romero Arano commissioned Palacios and Otamendi to create a free health care for day laborers in Madrid . They came up with this treasure, one of the few 20th century Madrid buildings built mostly of stone.
Immeasurable Fig Trees
Fernando Higueras is the architect of most of the buildings that your friends visiting Madrid ask you about. In 80 percent of the cases it is like this: the labyrinthine facade of Serrano 69; the hanging gardens of the Plaza de San Bernardo or the spaceship in the photo, the Institute of Cultural Heritage of Spain, a work of visionary architecture and complicated history (it is worth getting to know her) that began in 1966. Higueras is also the protagonist because for the first time the owners of it show the Casa Lucio Muñoz (built by the teacher) . And also because you can visit the headquarters of his Foundation, the amazing construction of 8 meters high that the architect made for himself... underground.