Palacio Barolo is one of the most interesting and unique buildings in Buenos Aires.
It was built by Italian architect Mario Palanti for wealthy textile merchant Luis Barolo. It was finished in 1923 and was at the time the highest building in Buenos Aires. The dome contains a lighthouse with 300,000 lights in it and can be used to transmit messages to the twin building Palacio Salvo in Montevideo, Uruguay.
Palanti had a bit of an obsession with Dante’s Divine Comedy.
The building is filled with allusions to the famous piece of literature.
The lobby represents Hell, and a guided tour will take you up to the lighthouse tower representing God and salvation.
The building height of 100 meters is a reference to each canto and its 22 floors is a reference to verses per song.
You can catch a tour in English or Spanish on Mondays and Thursdays at 4pm, 5pm, 6pm, and 7pm. They also offer nighttime tours for a great view of the city all lit up at night.
I can’t believe I missed this when I was in BA! What a cool looking building.
It’s cliche, but the most interesting building I have seen is the Duomo in Florence. The fact that it was built so long ago and people still don’t completely understand how the dome could have been created is incredible. Plus there was so much political intrigue going on behind the scenes… i’m a sucker for drama!
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That ‘s a pretty cool building. I felt like all of Florence looked like a movie set.
Stephanie – The Travel Chica recently posted..Foto of the Week from … Buenos Aires: Heaven and Hell
Buenos Aires is really full of surprises. I enjoyed my time there and will be back someday
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That’s one of the things I like about the city too
Stephanie – The Travel Chica recently posted..Foto of the Week from … Buenos Aires – Tacky
That building was intended to be a mausoleum for Dante Alighieri that never turn out to be one, Mr Barolo built the place and sent a request to the Italian government who reject the idea of sending the mortal remains of their greatest writer outside Italy.
So many interesting pieces to the story. I find this to be the strangest. I mean, who thinks they can just request the remains of a famous person to be sent to them just because they built a building in their honor?
Stephanie – The Travel Chica recently posted..Seeing Nothing and Experiencing More
Gorgeous building – to me it seems like a mix of French and Spanish styles. But I know nothing about architecture….
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I’m terrible about identifying architectural styles too. That’s why tours and guidebooks are good
Stephanie – The Travel Chica recently posted..Seeing Nothing and Experiencing More
That’s fascinating that he put so much effort to relate to the “Divine Comedy”. Very unique indeed.
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This looks like an awesome building! The most interesting building I’ve seen was in Port of Spain, Trinidad. I fell in love with Ambard’s House, or Roomor. It just blew me away. If it weren’t privately owned, I would have hopped over the fence and went exploring!
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Never been there or heard of this building. Too bad you couldn’t go inside.
Stephanie – The Travel Chica recently posted..Foto of the Week from … Buenos Aires – Tacky
Buenos Aires is really heaven for me. The place is awesome for various attractions to visit. The historical structures are amazingly to watch in the Buenos Aires. Indeed, the structure you have posted is just one of the awesome historical place to visit in Buenos Aires.
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Very attractive image that catch my attention they look really great! Thanks for sharing this beautiful photo…
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One of my favourite buildings there I wish I had gone up it.
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The hard part is deciding day or night tour!
Stephanie – The Travel Chica recently posted..Foto of the Week from … Buenos Aires – Tacky
I took a free city tour that included this building (just the outside) but somehow I missed the part about the lighthouse, signals and a twin building in Montevideo. Very interesting. Do you know why there was a twin building?
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I have been on at least 3 tours that go by the outside of the building, but I cannot remember why the twin building was built in Montevideo. It’s the same architect, so maybe he just got two jobs around the same time and decided it would be fun to make them similar.
Stephanie – The Travel Chica recently posted..Foto of the Week from … Buenos Aires – Tacky
Funny! Though not entirely implausible…
Jeff recently posted..Buying a Prepaid SIM Card While Traveling: What You Need to Know
Okay, I think I love everything about this building – from the architecture to the literary references to the 300,000 lights up top and the ability to transmit messages to Uruguay – holy cow!
Christy @ Technosyncratic recently posted..Floating Village in Halong Bay, Vietnam
It certainly has it all
Stephanie – The Travel Chica recently posted..Foto of the Week from … Buenos Aires – Tacky
LOVE quirky buildings and hearing the stories behind them.
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What a beautiful building! I would LOVE to see this all lit up at night!
dtravelsround recently posted..Escape of the Week: Sculptures at Pilane
Someone should do a night tour of BA by car and just drive around and see all of the cool buildings and monuments lit up at night.
Stephanie – The Travel Chica recently posted..Foto of the Week from … Buenos Aires – Tacky
That is a super rad concept!
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