The Casa de la Panadería is a municipal and cultural building on the north side of the Plaza Mayor in

Madrid Madrid ( ; ) is the capital and List of largest cities in Spain, most populous municipality of Spain. It has almost 3.5 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 7 million. It i ...

. It is four stories high, the ground floor comprising porticos and the top floor in the form of an attic, with its sides crowned by angular towers.

History

The ''Casa de la Panadería'' (Bakery House) was erected during the construction of the Plaza Mayor.

Juan Gómez de Mora Juan Gómez de Mora (1586–1648) was a Spanish architect, active in the 17th century. He was a main figure of Spanish early-Baroque architecture in the city of Madrid. Spanish art historian Virginia Tovar Martín has published scholarly wor ...

was in charge of its construction, which was completed in 1619. After the second burning of the plaza in 1672, the building was rebuilt in seventeen months by Tomás Román, who commissioned painters

Claudio Coello Claudio Coello (2 March 1642 – 20 April 1693) was a Spanish-Portuguese Baroque painter. Coello is considered the last great Spanish painter of the 17th century. The son of Faustino Coello, a famous Portuguese sculptor, he was a court painter ...

and

José Jiménez Donoso José Jiménez Donoso (c.1632, Consuegra – 14 September 1690, Madrid) was a Spanish Baroque architect and painter. He decorated many of his own buildings, using the Italian technique of quadratura. Life and work He learned the rudiments of a ...

to decorate the interior and the frescoes on the facade. After the third burning of the plaza in 1790, the surviving ''Casa de la Panadería'' served as a reference for

Juan de Villanueva Juan de Villanueva (September 15, 1739 in Madrid – August 22, 1811) was a Spanish architect. Alongside Ventura Rodríguez, Villanueva is the best known architect of Spanish Neoclassicism. Biography His father was the sculptor Juan de Villa ...

's reconstruction of the rest of the plaza. ''La Casa de la Panadería'' has suffered several remodelings since then, most notably that carried out by Joaquín María de la Vega in 1880. In 1988, the Madrid City Council convened a public contest to undertake the decorating of the facade, due to the severe deterioration of the paintings done by painter and ceramicist Enrique Guijo in 1914. The artists

Guillermo Pérez Villalta Guillermo () is the Spanish form of the male given name William. The name is also commonly shortened to 'Guille' or, in Latin America, to nickname 'Memo'. People * Guillermo Amador (born 1974), American musician *Guillermo Amor (born 1967), Spanis ...

, Sigfrido Martín Begué, and Carlos Franco were invited to participate in the contest. Carlos Franco won with a design based on mythological figures such as

Cybele Cybele ( ; Phrygian: ''Matar Kubileya, Kubeleya'' "Kubeleya Mother", perhaps "Mountain Mother"; Lydian: ''Kuvava''; ''Kybélē'', ''Kybēbē'', ''Kybelis'') is an Anatolian mother goddess; she may have a possible forerunner in the earliest ...

, Proserpine,

Bacchus In ancient Greek religion and myth, Dionysus (; ) is the god of wine-making, orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, festivity, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, and theatre. He was also known as Bacchus ( or ; ) by the Gre ...

, and

Cupid In classical mythology, Cupid ( , meaning "passionate desire") is the god of desire, erotic love, attraction and affection. He is often portrayed as the son of the love goddess Venus and the god of war Mars. He is also known as Amor (Latin: ...

, as well as others invented by the artist, interwoven into the history of Madrid and the Plaza Mayor. The work to paint Carlos Franco's frescoes was carried out in 1992.

Uses

In the beginning, its lower levels housed the main bakery of the town. From 1732 on, it served as offices for the ''Peso Real'' and the ''Fiel Contraste.'' Between 1745 and 1774, the

Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando The Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando (RABASF; ), located on the Calle de Alcalá in the centre of Madrid, currently functions as a museum and gallery. A public law corporation, it is integrated together with other Spanish royal aca ...

(Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando) kept its headquarters there, as did the

Real Academia de la Historia The Royal Academy of History (, RAH) is a Spanish institution in Madrid that studies history "ancient and modern, political, civil, ecclesiastical, military, scientific, of letters and arts, that is to say, the different branches of life, of c ...

(Royal Academy of History) from 1774 to 1871. At the end of the 19th century, the Madrid City Council took charge of ''La Casa de la Panadería,'' converting it into the second ''Casa Consistorial de la Villa.'' Later on, it became the headquarters of the Municipal Library and Municipal Archives. Still later, it housed various municipal offices as well as institutions like the ''Centro Cultural Mesonero Romanos.'' Today its premises are occupied by the Madrid Tourist Board and the ground floor houses the Madrid Tourism Center.

Characteristics

Commemorative plaques

Spanish coat of arms

Found at the top center of ''La Casa de la Panadería'' are the royal Spanish arms from the reign of

Carlos II Charles II (6 November 1661 – 1 November 1700) was King of Spain from 1665 to 1700. The last monarch from the House of Habsburg, which had ruled Spain since 1516, he died without an heir, leading to a European Great Power conflict over the succ ...

. Note that the arms of

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, is a country on the Iberian Peninsula in Southwestern Europe. Featuring Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point in continental Europe, Portugal borders Spain to its north and east, with which it share ...

are missing, as Portugal had recently regained its independence from Spanish rule. This shield is composed of the arms of Castile and León in the first quarter, the arms of

Aragón Aragon ( , ; Spanish and ; ) is an autonomous community in Spain, coextensive with the medieval Kingdom of Aragon. In northeastern Spain, the Aragonese autonomous community comprises three provinces (from north to south): Huesca, Zaragoza, a ...

and

Sicily Sicily (Italian language, Italian and ), officially the Sicilian Region (), is an island in the central Mediterranean Sea, south of the Italian Peninsula in continental Europe and is one of the 20 regions of Italy, regions of Italy. With 4. ...

in the second, the arms of

Austria Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...

and Burgundy modern in the third, and the arms of Burgundy ancient and Brabant in the fourth. The arms of

Flanders Flanders ( or ; ) is the Dutch language, Dutch-speaking northern portion of Belgium and one of the communities, regions and language areas of Belgium. However, there are several overlapping definitions, including ones related to culture, la ...

and

Tyrol Tyrol ( ; historically the Tyrole; ; ) is a historical region in the Alps of Northern Italy and western Austria. The area was historically the core of the County of Tyrol, part of the Holy Roman Empire, Austrian Empire and Austria-Hungary, f ...

are found in the lower escutcheon on the nombril point, and the symbol for

Granada Granada ( ; ) is the capital city of the province of Granada, in the autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Andalusia, Spain. Granada is located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada (Spain), Sierra Nevada mountains, at the confluence ...

in the center of the shield. The arms of Portugal would have been situated in an escutcheon on the honor point, between those of Castile and León and those of Aragón.

History

Uses

Characteristics

Commemorative plaques

Spanish coat of arms

See also