Sights in Madrid
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Centro de Arte Reina Sofía
Home to Picasso’s Guernica, arguably Spain’s single most famous artwork, and a host of other important Spanish artworks, the Centro de Arte Reina Sofía is Madrid’s premier collection of contemporary art. In addition to plenty of paintings by Picasso, other major drawcards are works by Salvador Dalí (1904-89) and Joan Miró (1893-1983).
The collection principally spans the 20th century up to the 1980s (for more recent works, visit the Museo Municipal de Arte Contemporáneo). The occasional non-Spaniard artist makes an appearance (including Francis Bacon’s 1966 Lying Figure), but most of the collection is strictly peninsular.
The permanent collection is displayed…
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Plaza Mayor
For centuries the centrepiece of Madrid life, the stately Plaza Mayor combines supremely elegant architecture with a history dominated by peculiarly Spanish dramas. Pull up a chair at the outdoor tables around the perimeter or laze upon the rough-hewn cobblestones as young madrileños have a habit of doing. All around you, the theatre that is Spanish street life buzzing through the plaza provides a crash course in why people fall in love with Madrid.
Ah, the history the plaza has seen! Designed in 1619 by Juan Gómez de Mora and built in typical Herrerian style, of which the slate spires are the most obvious expression, its first public ceremony was suitably auspicious –…
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Parque del Buen Retiro
The glorious gardens of El Retiro are as beautiful as any you’ll find in a European city. Littered with marble monuments, landscaped lawns, the occasional elegant building and abundant greenery, it’s quiet and contemplative during the week but comes to life on weekends. Put simply, this is one of our favourite places in Madrid.
Laid out in the 17th century by Felipe IV as the preserve of kings, queens and their intimates, the park was opened to the public in 1868 and ever since, whenever the weather’s fine and on weekends in particular, madrileños from all across the city gather here to stroll, read the Sunday papers in the shade, take a boat ride or nurse a cool…
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Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza
One of the most extraordinary private collections of predominantly European art in the world, the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza is a worthy member of Madrid’s ‘Golden Triangle’ of art. Where the Museo del Prado or Centro de Arte Reina Sofía enable you to study the body of work of a particular artist in depth, the Thyssen is the place to immerse yourself in a breathtaking breadth of artistic styles. Most of the big names are here, sometimes with just a single painting, but the Thyssen’s gift to Madrid and the art-loving public is to have them all under one roof. Its simple-to-follow floor plan also makes it one of the most easily navigable galleries in Madrid. Not surprisingly,…
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Palacio Real
You can almost imagine how the eyes of Felipe V, the first of the Bourbon kings, lit up when the alcázar (Muslim-era fortress) burned down in 1734 on Madrid’s most exclusive perch of real estate. His plan? Build a palace that would dwarf all its European counterparts. The Italian architect Filippo Juvara (1678-1736), who had made his name building the Basilica di Superga and the Palazzo di Stupinigi in Turin, was called in but, like Felipe, he died without bringing the project to fruition. Upon Juvara’s death, another Italian, Giovanni Battista Sacchetti, took over, finishing the job in 1764.
The result was an Italianate baroque colossus with some 2800 rooms, of…
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Museo del Prado
Welcome to one of the premier art galleries anywhere in the world. The more than 7000 paintings held in the Museo del Prado’s collection (although only around 1500 are currently on display) are like a window onto the historical vagaries of the Spanish soul, at once grand and imperious in the royal paintings of Velázquez, darkly tumultuous in Las Pinturas Negras (Black Paintings) of Goya and outward-looking with sophisticated works of art from all across Europe. Spend as long as you can at the Prado or, better still, plan to make a couple of visits because it can be a little overwhelming if you try to absorb it all at once. Either way, it’s an artistic feast of rare…
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Las Vistillas, Viaduct & Calle de Segovia
Jardines de las Vistillas, the leafy area around and beneath the southern end of the viaduct that crosses Calle de Segovia, is an ideal spot to pause and ponder the curious history of one of Madrid’s oldest barrios. Probably the best place to do this is just across Calle de Bailén where the terrazas (oper-air cafés) of Las Vistillas offer one of the best vantage points in Madrid for a drink, with views towards the Sierra de Guadarrama. During the civil war, Las Vistillas was heavily bombarded by Nationalist troops from the Casa de Campo, and they in turn were shelled from a republican bunker here. The adjacent viaduct, which was built in the 19th century and replaced…
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Plaza de la Cebada
Just west of La Latina metro station, the busy and bar-strewn corner of Madrid marked by the ill-defined ‘Barley Square’ is important to understanding what medieval Madrid was like, although it requires a little imagination. In the wake of the Christian conquest the square was, for a time, the site of a Muslim cemetery, and the nearby Plaza de la Puerta de Moros (Moors’ Gate) underscores that this area was long home to the city’s Muslim population. The square later became a popular spot for public executions – until well into the 19th century, the condemned would be paraded along Calle de Toledo, before turning into the square and mounting the gallows. The …
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Plaza de Neptuno
Officially known as Plaza de Cánovas del Castillo, the next roundabout south of Cibeles is something of a crossroads of Spanish nobility. The Ritz and the Palace, two of Madrid’s longest-standing and most exclusive hotels, glower at each other across the plaza with self-righteous grandeur, while the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza and the Prado do likewise in competition for the title of Madrid’s best loved repository of fine art. The centrepiece is an ornate fountain and 18th-century sculpture of Neptune, the sea god, by Juan Pascual de Mena. But madrileños, never the most reverent lot, know it better as the celebration venue of choice for fans of Atlético de Madrid who lose…
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Plaza de Oriente
A royal palace that once had aspirations to be the Spanish Versailles. Sophisticated cafes watched over by apartments that cost the equivalent of a royal salary. The Teatro Real, Madrid’s opera house and one of Spain’s temples to high culture. Some of the finest sunset views in Madrid. Welcome to Plaza de Oriente, a living, breathing monument to imperial Madrid.
At the centre of the plaza, which the palace overlooks, is an equestrian statue of Felipe IV. Designed by Velázquez, it's the perfect place to take it all in with marvellous views wherever you look. If you’re wondering how a heavy bronze statue of a rider and his horse rearing up can actually maintain that…
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Plaza de la Cibeles
Of all the grand roundabouts that punctuate the Paseo del Prado, Plaza de la Cibeles most evokes the splendour of imperial Madrid.
The jewel in the crown is the astonishing Palacio de Comunicaciones. Built between 1904 and 1917 by Antonio Palacios, Madrid’s most prolific architect of the belle époque, it combines elements of the North American monumental style of the period with Gothic and Renaissance touches. It serves as Madrid’s town hall (Ayuntamiento), with the main post office occupying the southwestern corner. Other landmark buildings around the plaza’s perimeter include the Palacio de Linares and Casa de América, the Palacio Buenavista (1769) and the…
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Plaza de España
It’s hard to know what to make of this curiously unprepossessing square. The 1953 Edificio de España (Spain Building) on the northeast side clearly sprang from the totalitarian recesses of Franco’s imagination such is its resemblance to austere Soviet monumentalism, but there’s also something strangely grand and pleasing about it. To the north stands the rather ugly and considerably taller 35-storey Torre de Madrid (Madrid Tower). In the square itself is a statue of Cervantes. At the writer’s feet is a bronze statue of his immortal characters Don Quijote and Sancho Panza. The monument was erected in 1927. But Plaza de España is at its best down in its lower…
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Plaza de Lavapiés
The triangular Plaza de Lavapiés is one of the few open spaces in Lavapiés and it’s a magnet for all that’s good (a thriving cultural life) and bad (drugs and a high police presence) about the barrio. The Teatro Valle-Inclán, on the southern edge of the plaza, is a stunning contemporary addition to the eclectic Lavapiés streetscape. To find out what makes this barrio tick, consider dropping in to the Asociación de Vecinos La Corrala, just up the hill from the plaza, where staff are happy to highlight all that’s good about Lavapiés without dismissing its problems.
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Convento de las Descalzas Reales
The grim, prisonlike walls of this one-time palace keep modern Madrid at bay and offer no hint that behind the sober plateresque facade lies a sumptuous stronghold of the faith.
The compulsory guided tour (in Spanish) leads you up a gaudily frescoed Renaissance stairway to the upper level of the cloister. The vault was painted by Claudio Coello, one of the most important artists of the 17th-century Madrid School and whose works adorn San Lorenzo de El Escorial.
You then pass several of the convent’s 33 chapels – a maximum of 33 Franciscan nuns is allowed to live here (perhaps because Christ is said to have been 33 when he died) as part of a closed order. These nuns follow…
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Caixa Forum
This extraordinary structure down towards the southern end of the Paseo del Prado, is one of Madrid's most eye-catching architectural innovations. Seeming to hover above the ground, this brick edifice is topped by an intriguing summit of what looks like rusted iron. On an adjacent wall is the jardín colgante (hanging garden), a lush vertical wall of greenery almost four storeys high. Inside there are four floors of exhibition and performance space awash in stainless steel and with soaring ceilings. The exhibitions here are always worth checking out and include cover photography, painting and multimedia shows. But the building itself is always worth checking out…
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Plaza de la Puerta del Sol
The official centrepoint of Spain is a gracious hemisphere of elegant facades and often overwhelming crowds. It is, above all, a crossroads with people forever passing through on their way elsewhere.
In early times, the Puerta del Sol (the Gate of the Sun) was the eastern gate of the city and from here passed a road through the peasant hovels of the outer ‘suburbs’ en route to Guadalajara, to the northeast. The name of the gate appears to date from the 1520s, when Madrid joined the revolt of the Comuneros against Carlos I and erected a fortress in the east-facing arch in which the sun was depicted. The fort was demolished around 1570.
The main building on the square…
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11 March 2004 Memorial
In the modern northeastern corner of the Antigua Estación de Atocha, the 11 March 2004 Memorial is a moving monument to the victims of the 2004 terrorist attack at the station. Although partially visible from the Paseo de la Infanta Isabel, the memorial is best viewed from below. A glass panel shows the names of those killed, while the glass-and-perspex dome is inscribed with messages of condolence and solidarity left by well-wishers in a number of languages in the immediate aftermath of the attack. The 12m-high dome is designed so that the sun highlights different messages at different times of the day, while the effect at night is akin to flickering candles. It's…
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Gran Vía
It’s difficult to imagine Madrid without Gran Vía, the grand boulevard lined with towering belle époque facades that climbs up through the centre of Madrid from Plaza de España then down to Calle de Alcalá. But it has only existed since 1910, when it was bulldozed through what was then a labyrinth of old streets. Plans for the boulevard were first announced in 1862 and so interminable were the delays that a famous zarzuela (satirical musical comedy), La Gran Vía, first performed in 1886, was penned to mock the city authorities. When finally completed, 14 streets disappeared off the map, as did 311 houses, including one where Goya had once lived.
It may have…
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Teleférico
One of the world’s most horizontal cable cars (it never hangs more than 40m above the ground), the Teleférico putters out from the slopes of La Rosaleda (the rose garden of Parque del Oeste). The 2.5km journey takes you into the depths of the Casa de Campo, Madrid’s enormous green (in summer more a dry olive hue) open space to the west of the city centre. Try to time it so you can settle in for a cool lunch or evening tipple on one of the terrazas along Paseo del Pintor Rosales.
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Templo de Debod
Yes, that is an Egyptian temple in downtown Madrid. No matter which way you look at it, there’s something incongruous about finding the Templo de Debod in the Parque de la Montaña northwest of Plaza de España. The temple was saved from the rising waters of Lake Nasser in southern Egypt when Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser built the Aswan High Dam. After 1968 it was sent block by block to Spain as a gesture of thanks to Spanish archaeologists in the Unesco team that worked to save the monuments that would otherwise have disappeared forever.
Begun in 2200 BC and completed over many centuries, the temple was dedicated to the god Amon of Thebes, about 20km south of…
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Palacio de Cristal
Hidden among the trees south of Parque del Buen Retiro's lake is the Palacio de Cristal, a magnificent metal and glass structure that is arguably El Retiro’s most beautiful architectural monument. Weekend buskers, Chinese masseurs and tarot readers ply their trades, while art and photo exhibitions are sometimes held here.
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Plaza de Toros Monumental de Las Ventas
The Plaza de Toros Monumental de Las Ventas (often known simply as Las Ventas) is not the most beautiful bullring in the world – that honour probably goes to Ronda in Andalucía – but it is the most important. A classic example of the neo- mudéjar style, it was opened in 1931 and hosted its first corrida (bullfight) three years later. Like all bullrings, the circle of sand enclosed by four storeys, which can seat up to 25, 000 spectators, evokes more a sense of a theatre than a sports stadium; it also hosts concerts; see p210. To be carried high on the shoulders of aficionados out through the grand and decidedly Moorish Puerta de Madrid is the ultimate dream of any…
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Museo de Cerralbo
Huddled beneath the modern apartment buildings northwest of Plaza de España, this noble old mansion is a reminder of how wealthy madrileños (people from Madrid) once lived. The former home of the 17th Marqués de Cerralbo (1845–1922) – politician, poet and archaeologist – is a study in 19th-century opulence. The upper floor boasts a gala dining hall and a grand ballroom. The mansion is jammed with the fruits of the collector’s eclectic meanderings – from Oriental pieces to religious paintings and clocks.
On the main floor are spread suits of armour from around the world, while the Oriental room is full of carpets, Moroccan kilims, tapestries, musical…
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Plaza de la Villa
The intimate Plaza de la Villa is one of Madrid’s prettiest. Enclosed on three sides by wonderfully preserved examples of 17th-century barroco madrileño (Madrid-style baroque architecture: a pleasing amalgam of brick, exposed stone and wrought iron), it was the permanent seat of Madrid’s city government from the Middle Ages until recent years when Madrid’s city council relocated to the grand Palacio de Comunicaciones on Plaza de la Cibeles.
On the western side of the square is the 17th-century former ayuntamiento (town hall), in Habsburg-style baroque with Herrerian slate-tile spires. On the opposite side of the square is the Gothic Casa de los Lujanes, whose…
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Casa de la Moneda
The national mint (literally the ‘house of coin’) is a collectors’ treasure-trove of coins from Ancient Greece and Roman Spain and proceeds through the Byzantine, Visigothic and Islamic periods. The latter period is particularly well represented. Coins from the days of the Catholic Monarchs abound, and the collection continues through to the establishment of the peseta as the Spanish currency – only consigned to history by the introduction of the euro in 2002. Paper money ranges from a 14th-century Chinese note to revolutionary Russian cash. Also on display is an extensive collection of prints and grabados (etchings), lottery tickets since 1942 and stamps. You can…
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