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The houses and buildings of the Roma area are full
of elegant Art Nouveau style details; these
buildings take us back to the times of splendor of
the Porfirian era, creating visions of ladies
walking by in their elegant dresses and ostentatious
hats.
The Roma area was originated in the colonial era
with the establishment of the Romita Hacienda, place
in which a small chapel surrounded by narrow
alleyways and a beautiful little plaza at its
entrance can still be found. The area started to
develop, in the time of Porfirio Diaz, when the land
was divided; it took its name from the Hacienda.
Around that time, the growing middle and high-class
population started to leave the centre of the city,
creating different areas (or districts) around it,
which are called “Colonias”, name taken from the
first European populations in America because these
areas were planned from the beginning and followed
the Western urban principles.
With the passing years, some rich families began to
build their great French-styled mansions in the
area, examples of which remain to this day, like the
Lamm House (today an important cultural centre), the
Rio de Janeiro building, the Balmori apartments, and
endless beautiful buildings that have been declared
cultural heritage by the National Institute of Fine
Arts.
Apart from the buildings mentioned before, the
characteristic thing about the Roma area are its
beautiful streets, like Alvaro Obregon Avenue with
its extensive boulevard surrounded by high ash trees
and which holds in the middle fountains and classic
sculptures; Orizaba Street, where the Temple of the
Sacred Family is located, communicates two beautiful
parks with fountains. One of the only two exact
bronze replicas of Michelangelo’s David can be found
in Rio de Janeiro Plaza, which also holds sculpture
exhibits and the best of contemporary art.
The area is experiencing a regeneration that is
slowly recovering the old buildings, conserving its
architectural characteristics, but giving them a new
function as apartments, coffee houses, galleries and
shops specialized in design and fashion.
Places of interest in this area:
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