Loading...
Alameda Park
The Alameda Park is the most prominent public park and the main lung of Santiago de Compostela, located halfway between two of its most emblematic elements, the University Campus and the historic center where the Cathedral is located.
Its current composition is the result of several extensions and restorations that today make up a magnificent architectural and botanical heritage made up of three well-differentiated areas: Carballeira de Santa Susana, Campo da Estrela and Paseo da Ferradura.
Alameda Park
General information
Some highlights about Alameda Park in A Coruña, Galicia (Spain)
Awards
Santiago de Compostela is a World Heritage Site - UNESCO
Type of historic garden
Botanical gardens
Size
85.000 m2
Location
Rúa do Campiño da Ferradura s/nº. 15705
Santiago de Compostela, Galicia, España
Coordinates: 42.87708, -8.54711
Open in Google Maps
Timetables
Open 24 hours
Contact information
Web: santiagoturismo.com
Email: info@santiagoturismo.com
Phone: + 34 981 555 129
Alameda Park
Natural environment
Its topography is gently sloping. It is a garden of special botanical and monumental interest. In it there are several viewpoints over the old city, and the one that allows you to contemplate Mount Pedroso, the Residence (current Campus Sur or Campus Vida) and the southern outskirts of the city of Santiago. It has large areas of shade, grass and rest with benches.
Its privileged location, bordering a part of the historic city, and with a magnificent perspective on its west facade -the most monumental-, made it the main urban garden, also highlighted by the variety and size of its arboreal and ornamental species, such as the group of oaks, the splendid eucalyptus trees or the pergola with views that make up the horse chestnut trees on the Paseo de la Herradura.
Alameda Park
Historical background
In the twelfth century, Archbishop Gelmírez ordered the construction of a church to house the relics of Santa Susana, a temple that was remodeled in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and which today is surrounded by more than three hundred year old oak trees that form a magnificent oak, the carballeira of Santa Susana.
Campo da Estrela
In 1546, the noble Rodrigo de Moscoso Osorio y Álvarez de Toledo, IV Countof Altamira, donated some agricultural land for the use and enjoyment of inhabitants of Santiago. In 1835, the Santiago city council began the creation o fthe Campo da Estrela (Field of the Star), and the Paseo da Ferradura, which surrounds the Santa Susana carballeira.
Puerta Faxeira
In 1885 two large sculptural figures in the shape of a lion were transfered from the Puerta Faxeira, being placed at the entrance of the Paseo da Ferradura, a semicircular path that borders the Alameda. Since then, this section has been called Paseo de los Leones (walk of the lions).
Alameda Park
Description
The Alameda Park is the most prominent public park and the main lung of Santiago de Compostela, located halfway between two of its most emblematic elements, the University Campus and the historic center where the Cathedral is located. Its current composition is the result of several extensions and restorations that today make up a magnificent architectural and botanical heritage made up of three well-differentiated areas: Carballeira de Santa Susana, Campo da Estrela and Paseo da Ferradura.
Exotic species
In addition to its recreational and recreational function, the garden of about 85,000 square meters, stands out for housing a significant number of exotic species, of great botanical interest. Although its design does not respond to any of the usual types of garden, it has elements of the French garden such as symmetrical flowerbeds and hedges and elements of English such as the Carballeira de Santa Susana.
Among the trees, some included in the Catalog of Senlleiras de Galicia Trees stand out, such as the Eucalyptus globulus; "La Perona", a specimen of Abies nordmanniana planted in commemoration of Eva Duarte de Perón's visit to Paseo de la Herradura in 1947, and the silver linden trees of Campo de la Estrella.
Camellia
Camellia is well represented throughout the set by a total of 66 specimens, all of them Camellia japonica, such as those found in the Paseo de la Herradura, they exceed a century of life, planted for the Agricultural, Industrial and Artistic Exhibition, held in the city in 1858.
Alameda Park
Chronology
- 1546
The history of La Alameda begins in 1546, when the Count of Altamira made a donation to the municipality to “plant trees and groves”. From that moment on, the grove spaces designed for recreation and recreation were being configured, planting masses of trees visible in some old plans of the city, being López Freire's plans from 1786 the ones that clearly show their organization for the first time.
The current park space, the result of successive projects and reforms, consists of 85.000m divided into three main areas: the Santa Susana carballeira (oak grove) and the Alameda and La Herradura promenades and gardens. - 19th-20th century
The oldest part of the park is the area known as Alameda, gardens that in the past were known as “Campo da Estrela”. This area has a distribution in three rooms or spaces, a division that until the 19th century was designed to separate the different social classes. This space was changing throughout the 20th century, adapting to the new possibilities offered by gardening, installing a bandstand in which frequent concerts of the municipal band still take place today. Of this space we highlight for the visitor its central walk, where you can enjoy old specimens of camellias, linden trees and bananas and in their furniture, especially the granite benches with artistic cast iron backing, from the well-known Galician factory of Sargadelos.
The carballeira de Santa Susana maintains the same appearance since the 18th century, when it was already an oak grove with some hundred-year-old trees. Throughout the nineteenth century and much of the twentieth century, it hosted the Santiago cattle fair, being the city's "fairground", but since 1971 its function is only recreational, although during the main local festivals -La Ascensión and the Apostle - partially recovers its function as a party field. It owes its name of Santa Susana to the medieval church that stands in the middle of the trees, one of the churches consecrated by Diego Gelmírez in 1102 that still preserves a façade and some other decorative elements from its original factory. - 1909
In addition to the aforementioned church, there are other buildings integrated into the park, among them the Pilar church and an interesting modernist architecture: the Santa Susana nursery school, whose origin is in a Pavilion built for the Galician Regional Exhibition of 1909.
The Paseo de la Herradura is arranged as a belt surrounding the cavalry of Santa Susana, forming an oval or horseshoe-shaped walk that can be divided into various sections: the north known as Los Leones; the innermost or closest to the oak grove, called Paseo de Bóveda; and the outermost one that borders the University Campus, known as Paseo de las Letras Gallegas.
The most famous section of La Herradura is known as “Paseo de los Leones”, a long walk that runs between two rows of old oak trees parallel to the Rúa do Pombal from which you can enjoy beautiful views over the cathedral and the monumental area, for it has benches and viewpoints. Along the promenade a bronze sculpture of the Galician writer Ramón María del Valle Inclán has also recently been arranged. Below we can find another sculpture dedicated to writer Isaac Díaz Pardo and another dedicated to Federico García Lorca.
Also the most external section - from which the University campus can be accessed through a magnificent stone staircase - is of great interest, as it concentrates specimens of a great variety and botanical richness, among which some magnolias and palm trees of great age and size, as well as examples of very rare species such as the Normandy fir or Eucalyptus globulus. In this space there is another sculpture, a large stone sculpture-monument from the 19th century dedicated to the Galician writer Rosalía de Castro.