Plaza de España, Monument to Cervantes, the heart of Madrid

Plaza de España, 28008 Madrid

Landmark building in Madrid

3.7

Introduction

The Plaza de España is located at the end of Gran Via, featuring in the center the Monument to Cervantes accompanied by two tall buildings. The monument was built in 1916 to commemorate the 300th anniversary of the death of Miguel de Cervantes, the greatest writer in Spanish history and the image is that of the protagonist Don Quixote and Sancho Panza from the novel. The tall building on the north side of the square is the Madrid Tower, which has a pure white facade and was completed in 1957 with a height of 142 meters. For the following decade, it was the tallest building in Europe until it was surpassed by the South Tower in Brussels, Belgium at 150 meters in 1967. The tall building behind the Monument to Cervantes is the Spain Building, designed in a specific shape to match the monument's shape and built to avoid blocking the monument's view.