The quintessential mansion of traditional Canarian architecture, Casa Méndez-Fonseca de la Orotava, better known as “Casa de los Balcones” or House of the Balconies, is unquestionably the highest expression of traditional Canarian urban architecture on the island of Tenerife. Built between 1632 and 1675, on Calle San Francisco in the urban area of the town of Orotava, surrounded by illustrious ancestral homes, all of them bearing storied coats of arms of nobles in marble or basalt, the Casa de Méndez-Fonseca, for its incomparable courtyard and its excellent façade, shines as only she knows and can.
In the 1850s, the Canarian businessman Mr. Antonio Díaz-Flores y Cartaya built a spectacular large mansion that could be stylistically framed in romantic classicism.
In 1928 construction began on what, from 1975 on, have been the facilities of the Liceo Taoro, the most traditional and deep-rooted social club in the Orotava Valley, an institution founded in 1855 under the name of Falansterio de Taoro (The Taoro phalanstery).
Built at the end of the 16th century and totally destroyed as a result of the volcanic eruption that devastated the town and port of Garachico in 1706, LA CASA DE LA QUINTA ROJA, is a superb example of traditional Canarian architecture. An urban mansion rebuilt in the 18th century respecting the same layout plan of the mansion that preceded it.
Among the most outstanding mansions of the first quarter of XXth Century of Santa Cruz de Tenerife expansion area, is Villa Petra, a beautiful eclectic palace designed in 1921 by the famous island architect Mr. Domingo Pisaca Burgada, in what constituted his first job once he finish his architecture career in Mainland Spain.
The house of the Ximénez-Franchi is undoubtedly one of the most monumental historical urban mansions of the Canary Islands. Located in the town of Orotava, following the famous "Casa de los Balcones" (The house of the balconies), this fantastic 17th century building has not received, in our humble opinion, the recognition it deserves, perhaps because it is in the shadow of its known neighbor or mistakenly considered by many as a mere prolongation of the previous, or any case, whatever is the reason, few Canarian urban buildings have the bearing and the ancestry of this exceptional mansion.
It was Mr. Domingo José Herrera Ayala and Roxas Ponte and Llarena Xuárez del Castillo, XI Count of La Gomera, who, following his marriage in 1754 with Doña Marina Leonor Benítez de Lugo and Ponte, built this great rural and palatial “hacienda” in what had been the estate of the Benítez de Lugo family in the area of El Durazno from the first land deals that followed the conquest of the island of Tenerife and its incorporation to the Crown of Castile in 1496 and more specifically from June 6 of 1502.
Castles usually generate a huge attraction on most people, because they are constructions that usually stand out because of their size or location, because of their greater or lesser character or condition of impregnable bulwark. Castles are headquarters and expression of power and wealth. They are milestones along the way.
The well-known house-palace of Guerra in the street of Nava and Grimón, former street of the Water, in San Cristóbal de La Laguna, is a building that sinks its roots in the time.
La Hacienda or Finca La Zamora is perhaps the last of the large family mansions built in the heart of the Orotava Valley, within the municipality of Los Realejos, following the pattern of the large country side Canary Manor Houses.
It is an eighteenth Century superb Tenerife mansion, built by former Colonel Matias Franco de Castilla, following the town pattern of the time. It is located in the central 81 Herradores Street in San Cristobal de la Laguna, the former capital of Tenerife and UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The Palace of the Counts of the Salazar Valley, now known as the Bishop´s Palace for being the headquarters of the Diocese Nivariense since 1892, is perhaps, within the large urban houses of the island, the historic mansion of Tenerife par excellence.
OurTenerife | July 15, 2023 
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