A walk down Billinghurst enables you to see the diversity of neighborhoods in Buenos Aires. The northern terminus of Billinghurst at Av del Libertador in Palermo are three grand mansions that are now the Spanish embassy and the ambassador residences of Saudi Arabia and Italy.
Billinghurst crosses into the edge of Recoleta and is lined with mostly unremarkable, contemporary apartment buildings whose only outstanding attribute is their location on the edge of Recoleta and Palermo.
At Av Cordoba the street changes significantly, becoming wider, and the quality of buildings is decidedly not as pretentious. You have entered Almagro. There’s a particularly intriguing structure at the juncture of San Luis, Billinghurst, and Tucuman. Looks like the architect had fun with this one.
Traveling further into Almagro and you’ll just a few blocks behind Abasto and in an old Jewish neighborhood. On one corner is a kosher butcher.
Does anyone know what the word Ufarasta means? I’m assuming it’s Hebrew.
Back to the walk: cross the train tracks, then cross Av Rivadavia where Billinghurst changes names to Virrey Liniers. This large house at the corner of Venezuela (Virrey Liniers 541) is undergoing a careful renovation. It’s quite a massive place. The renovation work continued along the side of the house, too.
I’m a little worried about this place (below) at Mexico 3401, a large corner lot all boarded up….looks like a spot ready for demolition.
Remember the embassy and ambassador residences at the other end of the street, some 37 blocks to the north? Here’s the contrast at the edge of Boedo.
This house isn’t empty. People live there and a family of four, plus dog, live under the highway overpass just beyond this house.
But this isn’t reflective of Boedo, which is a pleasant area, but I’m sure there are not any ambassador residences in Boedo.
February 29th, 2008 at 12:19 am
Correct me if I am wrong, but I thought once you crossed Coronel Diaz, it was Bario Norte, not full fledged Recoleta. And Billinghurst is smack dab in the middle of it.
One of the things that happens in Buenos Aires is that there is just so much amazing architecture that you tend to overlook very nice buildings, which would be outstanding in any North American city, and even in many Northern European ones.
Billinghurst between Libertador and Cordoba does have a fair amount of postwar infill- but there are still scores of very nice, if not spectacular, 3 to 5 story buildings that would be coveted elsewhere.
My apartment on Billinghurst, near Santa Fe, is in a building dating from 1924- and the blocks surrounding it are generally still 1/2 to 3/4 full of similar buildings.
The architecture of Buenos Aires is a surfeit of riches. Probably one of the two or three largest pools of well preserved late 19th Century-early 20th Century buildings in the world, and, for various political and economic reasons, one of the least disturbed and renovated.
It is sad to see buildings go- and hopefully Portenos will realize what a treasure they have- my friends are still of the “Culo del Mundo” mindset, as opposed to being aware of how incredible the architecture is.
February 29th, 2008 at 1:35 am
Hi Ries, I simply used the Recoleta designation based on barrio boundaries on the BsAs govt city map site. Billinghurst is just barely within the edge of Recoleta officially. There’s always different definitions of Barrio Norte, but the common one that I’ve always heard was used for the combination of both Recoleta & Retiro. Until looking at the map I actually thought that section of Billinghurst was Palermo.
Yeah, there is some great architecture but in the area but there definitely is a dominance of more modern stuff.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:50 pm
That second house is awesome, a great use of the space and the design is really cool. I’m guessing it’s been renovated recently and modified but it’s been done really well. It’d be known as a ‘casa crucero’ here in Valparaiso, built in the shape of a ship. There are quite a few here (including my own) but none with that kind of outrageous design.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:01 pm
Hi Matt, I totally agree about the 2nd house. A really cool example of what can be done in a quality renovation.
March 5th, 2008 at 4:40 pm
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March 6th, 2008 at 6:27 am
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