Casa Lis (Museo Art Nouveau y Art Déco), Salamanca
A glass-and-iron palace built into the old city wall, now a museum of Art Nouveau and Art Déco.
At a glance
Casa Lis is the finest Modernista building in Salamanca, a city otherwise carved in golden stone. The provincial architect Joaquín de Vargas y Aguirre (1857–1935) built it in 1905 for Miguel de Lis (1855–1909), an industrialist enriched by the leather trade who had seen the new European styles on his travels. The house rises on the line of the old city wall above the Tormes, and its river front is a screen of coloured glass. Since 1995 it has held the Museo Art Nouveau y Art Déco.
Key facts
- Location: Calle Gibraltar 14, Salamanca
- Architect: Joaquín de Vargas y Aguirre
- Built: completed 1905
- Style: Spanish Modernismo (Art Nouveau)
- Today: Museo Art Nouveau y Art Déco (since 1995)
History
Miguel de Lis ran a leather factory near the Tormes and wanted a home in the modern manner he had admired abroad. He commissioned Vargas, the provincial architect of Salamanca, who built the mansion on the ancient wall, exploiting the steep drop to the river to open a luminous south front of iron and glass.
After changing hands and falling into decay, the house was restored and, in 1995, opened as a museum thanks to the antiquarian Manuel Ramos Andrade, who gave the city nineteen collections of decorative art. It now shows objects from the late nineteenth century to the Second World War, the perfect contents for the building that holds them.
What you see
The two faces of the house could belong to different cities. The north front on Calle Gibraltar is sober, in stone and brick with Art Nouveau iron railings, in keeping with old Salamanca. The south front, facing the river, is the opposite: a wall of iron and stained glass, terraced down the slope, that lights up like a lantern at sunset.
Inside, the rooms ring a central courtyard roofed by a vast stained-glass canopy, so the whole house is bathed in coloured light. The collections of glass, bronzes, porcelain dolls and jewellery sit perfectly within these Modernista and Art Déco rooms.
Practical information
- Open: as a museum (Museo Casa Lis); closed some days
- Cost: museum admission
- Best for: the stained-glass south façade and the glazed courtyard
- Time needed: 1–1.5 hours
Getting there
Casa Lis is on Calle Gibraltar, on the southern edge of Salamanca’s old town above the Tormes, a short walk from the Plaza Mayor and the cathedrals.
Nearby
- Old and New Cathedrals of Salamanca — the great golden-stone churches nearby
- Roman Bridge of Salamanca — the ancient crossing of the Tormes below the house
Sources
- Museo Art Nouveau y Art Déco Casa Lis (museocasalis.org) — history
- Ayuntamiento de Salamanca / Turismo de Salamanca — Casa Lis
- Wikimedia Commons — image source and licence
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