Casa de los Botines

Shubina Zhenya

The Casa de los Botines (built 1892-1893) is a modernist building in León, Spain designed by Antoni Gaudí. Today, it serves as the headquarters of the Caja España bank.

While Gaudí was finishing the construction of the Episcopal

Palace of Astorga, his friend and patron,

Eusebi Güell recommended that he build a house in the center of León. Simón Fernández and Mariano Andrés, the owners of a company that bought fabrics from Güell, commissioned Gaudí to build a residential building with a warehouse. The house's nickname comes from the last name of the company's former owner, Joan Homs i Botinàs.

In 1929, the savings bank of León, Caja España, bought the building and adapted it to its needs, without altering Gaudí's original project.

The building

Gaudí designed a building with a medieval air and numerous neo-Gothic characteristics.

The building consists of : four floors a basement and an attic. Gaudí chose an inclined roof and placed towers in

the corners to reinforce the project's neo-Gothic feel. To ventilate and illuminate the basement, he created

a moat.

On the inclined roof, six skylights supported by iron tie-beams illuminate and ventilate the attic.

The ensemble is

supported on a

complex wooden

framework.

Gaudí placed the owners' dwellings on the first floor. The upper floors house rental property and the lower floor contains the company offices.

The building's principal entrance is crowned by a wrought iron inscription with the name of the company and by a stone sculpture of Saint George.

sculpture of Saint George

Gaudí had envisioned a continuous base, like that of the city's cathedral.

Despite rumors that the building would collapse during construction, the house has never had structural problems. On the ground floor, the architect used —for the first time— a system of cast-iron pillars.