The Palace of Flowing Waters (built in 1894) is an extravagantly grand water pumping station occupying an entire city block over on Córdoba and rather reminiscent of say The Natural History Museum or even St Pancras Station in London. The building’s Swedish engineer and Norwegian architect had a French renaissance palace in mind when they…

  “They say that sorrow and at last ruin comes upon the house on whose roof the shadow of the Ombú tree falls; and on that house which now is not, the shadow of this tree came every summer day when the sun was low. They say, too, that those who sit much in the…

Enrique Rodríguez Larreta was a prominent Argentine writer, academic and prolific collector of early Hispanic art and Ambassador to France. We popped into his rather lovely Spanish-Colonial house today in Belgrano which was (surprise, surprise) gifted to him and his newly minted wife by his mother-in-law, the formidable (afore-mentioned) Mercedes Castellanos de Anchorena (of the…

We have a different outlook on things as of today. We’ve moved apartment to the other side of the pool for our last two weeks here in Buenos Aires. I guess all good things must come to an end (or do they….?) but we thought a breath of aire fresco might be in order. Funnily…

The Cementerio de la Chacarita over towards Villa Crespo is not just the largest cemetery in Argentina at 230 acres, but perhaps the most beautiful, certainly much larger and definitely greener than aristocratic Recoleta Cemetery, with no looming apartment blocks peeking over the walls. Chacarita is lush with mature trees and features wide cobbled streets…

More from the ‘Only in Argentina’ files comes a fantastical tale of fame, fortune and  worldwide adoration, a tragic plane crash, wild public grief and, in more recent times, highly controversial and scandalous revelations that perhaps unfairly tarnish one of Argentina’s national treasures. This is a story straight out of (yet another) Latin American telenovela,…

In the heart of neighbouring barrio Barracas is Pasaje Lanín, a small residential cobblestoned laneway with its humble houses covered in brightly coloured murals and mosaics – urban art in all its kaleidoscopic splendour! It’s essentially an open-air art gallery conceived by local resident and wonderfully named artist Marino Santa María. He decorated his own…

Direct from the ‘Only in Argentina’ files comes a tale of intrigue, passion, untold wealth, jilted love and despair, spite and ultimately, sweet cold-served revenge – straight out of a Latin American telenovela*, though this one set in the glamour of 1920’s and 30’s Buenos Aires. The story has become somewhat legendary in this city…

As you probably know, Argentina experienced a right-wing politically led ‘dirty war’ on its own people between 1976 and 1983 when anyone suspected of involvement in ‘socialism’ or other forms of political dissent were ‘disappeared’ by the Junta. Incredibly, Argentina was said to have ‘hosted’ over 520 clandestine detention centres, many of them of course…

‘I met a traveller from an antique land, Who said— “Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert…Near them, on the sand, Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown, And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamped on these…