History of Interior Design Blog: Spanish Renaissance

What I Learned

This period was a fusion of Christian Spain with Moorish art that was called Mudejar. This term denotes a style of Iberian architecture and decoration, of the 12th to 16th centuries, strongly influenced by Moorish taste and workmanship. (This term is also used to describe Moors who converted to Christianity.) This style incorporated Islamic elements into the Romanesque, Gothic, and Renaissance style buildings that were being created. It is a symbiosis of techniques and ways of understanding architecture resulting from Muslim and Christian cultures living side by side. This style is characterized by the used of brick as the main material. These are some buildings done in Mudejar style:

Teruel Cathedral

Mudéjar Tower of El Salvador

Castle of La Mota

These two different religious groups created two different schools of art in Spain. One was the Moors from Africa and the other was the Spanish Christian groups. The final expulsion of the Moors occurred in 1607. This was a great lost to the handicrafts and commerce of southern Spain.

This is Alhambra which is the last of the Spanish palaces completed before the expulsion of the Moors. (1354)

The Court of Lions found inside Alhambra.

Court of Pools found inside Alhambra.

The Cathedral of Seville is located in Seville-Andalusia, Spain. It was the largest cathedral in the world in the 15th century and was even larger than the Hagia Sophia, which was the former holder of this title for nearly a thousand years. (Today it is the largest Gothic cathedral and the third-largest church in the world.) This cathedral contained 80 chapels and held 500 masses daily. It was built to demonstrate the wealth of the city. According to local lore, the members of the cathedral chapter said: "Let us build a church so beautiful and so grand that those who see it finished will think we are mad." Construction began in 1402 and continued until 1506. Five years after construction ended, in 1511, the dome collapsed and work on the cathedral recommenced. The dome collapsed again in 1888, and work was still being performed on the dome until at least 1903. The 1888 collapse occurred due to an earthquake and resulted in the destruction of "every precious object below" the dome at that time.

Cathedral of Seville Exterior

Here are some pictures from inside the cathedral:

The last picture is of the tomb of Christopher Columbus who is buried inside the cathedral.

There were several different design phase's in this period including Plateresco and Desornamentado. Plateresco had minute and delicate ornament that resembled the work of a silversmith. This is probably where the name was derived from seeing as platero is Spanish for silversmith. Here are some pictures exhibiting this style:

Desornamentado was a reaction to Plateresco style. It was a powerful style that was characterized by austerity and it used carefully defined proportions. Since it was a reaction to an ornamental style, this style was a much more simplistic style. It was applied to court, ecclesiastical, and public buildings. El Escorial, which is shown in the next three pictures, is an example of a building done in this style.

My Favorite Spanish Renaissance Architecture

I talked about and showed some pictures of Alhambra earlier, but it is still one of my favorites of the Spanish Renaissance. There are just so many beautiful pictures of this place. Here are some more:

Another one of my favorite buildings from this time is Jaén Cathedral by Andrés de Vandelvira who also had some other beautiful buildings from this time including Cathedral of Baeza and Vázquez de Molina Square .

Jaén Cathedral facade

Jaén Cathedral

Cathedral of Baeza exterior

Cathedral of Baeza interior

Vázquez de Molina Square

Modern Applications

This is the Casa del Prado Theater in San Diego's Balboa Park. It was constructed for the Panama-California Exposition in 1915-16 that commemorated the opening of the Panama Canal. As you can see it was created to emulate Spanish Renaissance style.

This is Flagler College in St. Augustine, FL. It was built on the grounds of an old luxury hotel built in 1988 with the Ponce de Leon hotel remaining as the centerpiece.