The Café Tortoni is a

coffeehouse A coffeehouse, coffee shop, or café (), is an establishment that serves various types of coffee, espresso, latte, americano and cappuccino, among other hot beverages. Many coffeehouses in West Asia offer ''shisha'' (actually called ''nargi ...

located at 825

Avenida de Mayo May Avenue () is an avenue in Buenos Aires, capital of Argentina. It connects the Plaza de Mayo with Congressional Plaza, and extends in a west–east direction before merging into Rivadavia Avenue. History and overview Built on an initiati ...

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires, controlled by the government of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Argentina. It is located on the southwest of the Río de la Plata. Buenos Aires is classified as an Alpha− glob ...

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

. First opened in 1858 by a French immigrant whose surname was Touan, it was named ''Tortoni'' after the

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

ian café of the same name located on '' Boulevard des Italiens'' (where the elite of Parisian culture gathered in the 19th century). The café itself was inspired by

Fin de siècle "''Fin de siècle''" () is a French term meaning , a phrase which typically encompasses both the meaning of the similar English idiom '' turn of the century'' and also makes reference to the closing of one era and onset of another. Without co ...

coffee houses. Café Tortoni was selected by UCityGuides as one of the ten most beautiful cafes in the world."Top 10: Most BEAUTIFUL CAFES in the World,"
UCityGuides. Accessed Dec. 4, 2012.

History

The area the café currently occupies was previously the location of the ''Templo Escocés'' (" Scottish Temple"), and the ''Tortoni'' was located on the corner of Rivadavia and Esmeralda. In 1880 it moved to its present location, but had its entrance on the other side of the block in Rivadavia Street. In 1898 the entrance on Avenida de Mayo was opened, and the facade was redesigned by architect Alejandro Christophersen. At the end of the 19th-century the café was bought by another Frenchman, Celestino Curutchet. In the basement, ''La Peña'' (see peña) was established in 1926, which fomented the protection of the arts and literature until its disintegration in 1943. Among its visitors were

Alfonsina Storni Alfonsina Storni (29 May 1892 – 25 October 1938) was a Swiss Argentines, Swiss-Argentine poet and playwright of the Modernismo, modernist period. Early life Storni was born on May 29, 1892, in Sala Capriasca, Switzerland. Her parents were Alf ...

, Baldomero Fernández Moreno es,

Juana de Ibarbourou Juana Fernández Morales de Ibarbourou, also known as Juana de América, (March 8, 1892 – July 15, 1979) was a Uruguayan poet and one of the most popular writers of Spanish America. Her poetry, the earliest of which is often highly erotic, is ...

Arthur Rubinstein Arthur Rubinstein Order of the British Empire, KBE OMRI (; 28 January 1887 – 20 December 1982) was a Polish Americans, Polish-American pianist.

, Ricardo Vines, Roberto Arlt,

José Ortega y Gasset José Ortega y Gasset (; ; 9 May 1883 – 18 October 1955) was a Spanish philosopher and essayist. He worked during the first half of the 20th century while Spain oscillated between monarchy, republicanism and dictatorship. His philosoph ...

Jorge Luis Borges Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo ( ; ; 24 August 1899 – 14 June 1986) was an Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator regarded as a key figure in Spanish literature, Spanish-language and international literatur ...

, Molina Campos, and Benito Quinquela Martín. Over the years the ''café'' has been visited by many renowned people including politicians

Lisandro de la Torre Lisandro de la Torre (6 December 1868 – 5 January 1939) was an Argentine politician, born in Rosario, Santa Fe. He was considered as a model of ethics in politics. He was a national deputy and senator, a prominent polemicist, and founder o ...

and

Marcelo Torcuato de Alvear Máximo Marcelo Torcuato de Alvear y Pacheco (4 October 1868 – 23 March 1942) served as president of Argentina between from 1922 to 1928. His period of government coincided precisely with the end of the Post-war, postwar world crisis, w ...

, popular idols

Carlos Gardel Carlos Gardel (born Charles Romuald Gardès; 11 December 1890 – 24 June 1935) was a French-born Argentine singer, songwriter, composer and actor, and the most prominent figure in the history of tango. He was one of the most influential inter ...

and

Juan Manuel Fangio Juan Manuel Fangio (, ; 24 June 1911 – 17 July 1995) was an Argentine racing driver, who competed in Formula One from to . Nicknamed "el Chueco" and "el Maestro", Fangio won five Formula One World Drivers' Championship titles and—at the ti ...

, international figures like

Albert Einstein Albert Einstein (14 March 187918 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist who is best known for developing the theory of relativity. Einstein also made important contributions to quantum mechanics. His mass–energy equivalence f ...

Federico García Lorca Federico del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús García Lorca (5 June 1898 – 19 August 1936) was a Spanish poet, playwright, and theatre director. García Lorca achieved international recognition as an emblematic member of the Generation of '27, a g ...

Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton ( Rodham; born October 26, 1947) is an American politician, lawyer and diplomat. She was the 67th United States secretary of state in the administration of Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013, a U.S. senator represent ...

Robert Duvall Robert Selden Duvall (; born January 5, 1931) is an American actor. With a career spanning seven decades, he is regarded as one of the greatest actors of all time. He has received an Academy Awards, Academy Award, a British Academy Film Awards ...

and Juan Carlos de Borbón. Currently the basement works as a stage for

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Its roots are in blues, ragtime, European harmony, African rhythmic rituals, spirituals, h ...

and

tango Tango is a partner dance and social dance that originated in the 1880s along the Río de la Plata, the natural border between Argentina and Uruguay. The tango was born in the impoverished port areas of these countries from a combination of Arge ...

artists, and for the presentation of book and poetry contests. The ''café'' has conserved the decoration of its early years, has a library and at the back facilities to play

billiards Cue sports are a wide variety of games of skill played with a cue stick, which is used to strike billiard balls and thereby cause them to move around a cloth-covered table bounded by elastic bumpers known as . Cue sports, a category of stic ...

dominoes Dominoes is a family of tile-based games played with gaming pieces. Each domino is a rectangular tile, usually with a line dividing its face into two square ''ends''. Each end is marked with a number of spots (also called ''Pip (counting), pips ...

and

dice A die (: dice, sometimes also used as ) is a small, throwable object with marked sides that can rest in multiple positions. Dice are used for generating random values, commonly as part of tabletop games, including dice games, board games, ro ...

Notable visitors

Gallery

File:Cafe Tortoni Av de Mayo 825.jpg, Tortoni exterior with Line A underground train entrance in the background File:Cafe Tortoni entrada.jpg, Entrance to the Café File:Cafe Tortoni La mesa que Borges acostumbraba ocupar.jpg,

's regular table, with wax sculpture File:Cafe Tortoni Peluqueria.jpg, Old barber area File:Cafe Tortoni tarima.jpg, Display of busts File:Café Tortoni 01.jpg, Plaque in front of the Cafe

References

External links

* {{Portal bar, Argentina Buildings and structures in Buenos Aires Tourist attractions in Buenos Aires Coffeehouses and cafés in Argentina 1858 establishments in Argentina National Historic Monuments of Argentina Restaurants established in 1858