La Recoleta Cemetery
La Recoleta Cemetery is a cemetery in Buenos Aires, Argentina, located in the Recoleta neighborhood. It is home to the graves of notable people such as Eva Perón, Argentina's presidents, Nobel Prize winners, the founder of the Argentine Navy, and military commanders such as Julio Argentino Roca. The BBC named it one of the world's best cemeteries in 2011, and CNN named it one of the top ten most beautiful cemeteries in the world in 2013.
In the early eighteenth century, Franciscan Recollect monks arrived in this area, which was then on the outskirts of Buenos Aires. The cemetery is built around the Recollect Convent, and Our Lady of Pilar Church was constructed in 1732. The order was disbanded in 1822, and the convent's garden was converted into the city's first public cemetery. The cemetery was inaugurated on November 17, the same year, under the name Cementerio del Norte, by then Governor Martin Rodriguez, who would eventually be buried there, and government minister Bernardino Rivadavia.
Próspero Catelin, a French civil engineer who also designed the current facade of the Buenos Aires Metropolitan Cathedral, designed the 1822 layout. The cemetery was last renovated by the Italian architect Juan Antonio Buschiazzo in 1881, while Torcuato de Alvear was mayor.
Set on 5.5 hectares (14 acres), the site contains 4691 vaults, all above ground, 94 of which have been designated by the Argentine government as National Historical Monuments and are protected by the state. The cemetery is entered through neoclassical gates with tall Doric columns. The cemetery contains many elaborate marble mausoleums decorated with statues in a variety of architectural styles such as Art Deco, Art Nouveau, Baroque, and Neo-Gothic, and the majority of materials used in the construction of tombs between 1880 and 1930 were imported from Paris and Milan. The cemetery is divided into sections that resemble city blocks, with wide tree-lined main walkways branching into sidewalks lined with mausoleums.
Location: Junín 1760, Buenos Aires, Argentina
