[NYTr] Cuba: The El Vedado House
 
Date: Tue, 2 Oct 2007 14:58:34 -0500 (CDT)

Via NY Transfer News Collective  *  All the News that Doesn't Fit
 
CubaNow - Oct 1, 2007
http://www.cubanow.net/global/loader.php?&secc=9&item=3430&c=2

The El Vedado House

By Cecilia Crespo

Cubanow.- In the b20s, the Havana area of El Vedado witnessed the
construction of one of its most representative mansions: the house
located at 664 23rd street.

The mansion was a wedding present from local businessman Manuel Campa
to his daughter Angela. She lived in the house until 1998, when she
passed away without leaving any heirs, and the Office of the City
Historian recently turned it into a peculiar institution: La Casa de El
Vedado (The El Vedado House).

The singularity of the place lies on its structure, which is not
necessarily that of a museum, since the house doesnbt have enclosed
areas or display glasses. It opened to the general public last July as
part of the bRutas y andares turistb project. The goal is to show the
everyday life of a high middle class family of the past. The house even
looks like therebs someone living in it.

The recreated atmosphere is effective. A team of specialists managed to
relive the old days through a strategy based on the rescue of
decorative elements and stylistic tendencies. Maria Elena Roche, the
director of this flaming institution, explains that the Office of the
City Historian was interested in rescuing a house which is far away
from the old town because bduring the second half of the 20th century,
wealthy families left the old town due to lack of space and the
settlement of trade and poor people in the area, to move into the area
known as Zanja Real del Cerro, where they established their houses, and
into another area known as El Carmelo. Later on, the urbanization of El
Vedado went under way, with a regular establishment of streets and
avenues. Therefore, this area became the one with the biggest social
interest due to its characteristics, and started to be get
vertiginously populated.b

Notable Cuban architect Mario Coyula has defined El Vedado as a bthe
biggest and most important piece of republican urbanism, both in terms
of size and avant-garde position in the old times, hand-in-hand with
the rest of the world,b which bis of utmost importance for urbanism and
architecture professionals.b

This typical exponent of eclectic architecture shows the excellent and
well-preserved furniture which belonged to wealthy families of the last
century, unique, rare, and valuable pieces, works of important portrait
artists, and even womenbs clothes of those years. 

                                 *
=================================================================
 NY Transfer News Collective     *    A Service of Blythe Systems
           Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us
            Our main website:   http://www.blythe.org
   List Archives:       http://blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/
   Subscribe:     http://blythe-systems.com/mailman/listinfo/nytr
=================================================================