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It is in front of Plaza San Martín and it has been covered by scaffolding for 15 years. It is the seat of National Parks. They launch a plan to restore it.
In a triangular block of the Retiro neighborhood is the Haedo Palace, considered the oldest in the north of the City, it is estimated that it was built in 1860. It is a National Historic Monument. It is located in the block comprised by Santa Fe, Maipú and Marcelo T. de Alvear. The main façade faces the avenue, in front of Plaza San Martín.
This building belongs to the National State and is the historical headquarters of the National Parks Administration. One of its current characteristics is the metallic structure that surrounds its façade. The scaffolding prevents the masonry from falling on passers-by, but hides the mansard roof with black slate tiles, the window ornaments and the corner turrets.
This building has been surrounded by scaffolding for 15 years, but this could change. The Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development of the Nation, together with the Ministry of Public Works, undertook an ambitious restoration program for the building.
The project consists of transforming it into an «interpretive museum»: «That serves for environmental education and interpretation of the countrys regions and ecosystems. It will have rooms for exhibitions, meetings, reports, a mini auditorium and a library”, they detail to Clarín from Parque Nacionales.
For the Ministry of Public Works, it is a work that adds to others that it is carrying out at the moment: for example, the restoration of the Confitería del Molino, which it carries out together with the City Government and the National Congress . In addition, he worked in the Basilica of Luján and now, in the Casa del Puente de Amancio Williams, in Mar del Plata.
The architect Fabio Grementieri is a member of the National Commission for Historic Monuments, Sites and Assets and describes the Haedo Palace as a petit hotel: "It has a castle-like appearance that makes it very unique, in addition to its location and the particularity of the apple; in Buenos Aires there are very few like that. Unfortunately it was heavily remodeled. This petit hotel is an important constitutive piece within the urban space that it integrates, the surroundings of Plaza San Martín. There it is part of the set of buildings of different styles that were built between the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th."
Many of the buildings that make up this axis in Retiro are national historical monuments such as the Anchorena Palace, ceremonial seat of the Foreign Ministry; the Palacio Paz, headquarters of the Military Circle and which was the largest residence in the City, and the Kavanagh building, an icon of rationalist architecture worldwide.
The Monumental or English Tower and the recently restored Miter Railroad Retiro Station are also National Historic Monuments. And there is one pending cataloging, the Plaza Hotel, closed today.
The National Commission of Historical Monuments, Places and Assets depends on the national Ministry of Culture and exercises supervision over all assets declared as monuments; must authorize all the interventions that are carried out.
At the city level, the Haedo Palace is part of an APH or Historical Protection Area. This area encompasses the other buildings mentioned and implies precautionary protection, which preserves "the characteristic image of an area and prevents alterations in its fabric and morphology." In other words, all constructions located within an APH have some type of protection.
According to official information, the restoration work on Palacio Haedo will have an estimated budget of 130 million pesos. They calculate that the works will demand between 20 and 24 months. But it is still necessary to determine when they will begin: "The executive project is pending," they explain. As it is a monument, the intervention of the Commission and also of the Heritage areas of the City of Buenos Aires must be given.
It is considered that the Haedo Palace was the first large house that was installed in that part of the City. The original owners were businessman Mariano F. Haedo, who was involved in the development of the railway network, and Rosa Santa Coloma Azcuénaga, who belonged to one of the most powerful families in the country at the time.
"The history of the Haedo residence places it around 1860 as the only surviving urban testimony of the Plaza San Martín from the mid-19th century," confirms the Guide to National Historic Monuments, where it is identified as "Old Villar Residence."
A decade later, the yellow fever epidemic broke out in Buenos Aires, the first cases of which were recorded in San Telmo, in January 1871. Many families from the upper classes left their colonial-style houses in the south of the city and moved to the North.
Thus Retiro ceased to be a marginal area and families began to commission the construction of their residences, petit hotels and palaces to the most renowned European architects. They did them from Plaza San Martín towards Avenida Alvear and Recoleta.
The original Haedo house had a ground floor and a first floor. It had two medieval-inspired battlemented towers facing the park: one octagonal and the other cylindrical. In 1890 the house was sold to Reinaldo Villar, who also belonged to a wealthy family of landowners from Entre Ríos.
Over the decades it underwent several transformations, until it reached its current appearance: the house grew one story and has a mansard roof added. The original turrets disappeared and were replaced by cupolas and conical towers. Mortgaged, in 1942 it was bought by the National State and designated as the headquarters of the National Parks Administration.
AWARD | PALACIO HAEDO – RESTORATION AND UPGRADE OF THE EXTERIOR ENVELOPE OF THE BUILDING REFUNCTIONALIZATION OF THE INTERIOR ELEVATORS AND COMPLEMENTARY INSTALLATIONS
Client: MINISTRY OF PUBLIC WORKS
Place: City of Buenos Aires
Opening date: 06/16/2022 12:00 p.m.
Official budget: $425,341,349 See Tender
PRE-AWARDEE: KIR SRL $579,388,343.39 |
