Famous Landmarks in Caracas
Neoclassical civic monuments crowd a colonial grid pressed against a 2,200-metre ridge.
Caracas' oldest landmarks cluster around Plaza Bolívar, the historic core laid out after the city's colonial founding: the neoclassical Caracas Cathedral closes the square's eastern side, and the Federal Legislative Palace stands just southwest of it. Both are nineteenth-century civic monuments, built when President Antonio Guzmán Blanco remade central Caracas along European academic lines, replacing older colonial fabric with neoclassical facades and domes. The National Pantheon, on the old town's northern edge, was raised over the ruins of an eighteenth-century church during the same building wave. This historic center sits low in the Caracas Valley, hemmed in by the 2,200-metre Cerro El Ávila to the north and further hills to the south; far taller construction has since risen around it.
Caracas Cathedral
1674
Its neoclassical facade closes the eastern side of the city's colonial main square, beside a courtyard walled on three sides and open only toward the church; a small chapel of the Holy Trinity holds the tombs of Simón Bolívar's parents and wife.
The Caracas Cathedral, also called the Metropolitan Cathedral of Saint Anne, is the seat of the Roman Catholic Metropolitan archdiocese of Caracas, built in 1674 on Plaza Bolívar. Its chapel of the Holy Trinity holds the tombs of Simón Bolívar's parents and wife. Beside it lies a colonial square walled on three sides and open only where it faces the cathedral. The building is protected as a national historical monument of Venezuela and remains an active parish church.
- Its chapel of the Holy Trinity holds the remains of Simón Bolívar's parents and wife, though Bolívar himself is entombed at the National Pantheon.
Photo: Veronidae (CC BY-SA 3.0)
National Pantheon of Venezuela
1875
A large crystal chandelier hangs over the central nave, where Simón Bolívar's bronze sarcophagus stands at the altar beneath a vault painted in the 1930s with scenes from his life, while lesser Venezuelan heroes are buried along the side aisles.
The National Pantheon of Venezuela is the final resting place of the country's national heroes, created in the 1870s on the site of the ruined Santísima Trinidad church, built in 1744. Its central nave is dedicated entirely to Simón Bolívar, whose bronze sarcophagus takes the altar's place, while other honored figures rest in the aisles. The building's crystal chandelier was hung in 1883, and its painted vault added in the 1930s. It reopened in 2013 after a three-year restoration and expansion.
- The pantheon stands on the ruins of the Santísima Trinidad church, built in 1744.
- Its crystal chandelier was installed in 1883, the centennial of Simón Bolívar's birth.
Photo: Wilfredor (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Federal Legislative Palace
1872–1877 · Luciano Urdaneta
A golden dome caps the elliptical Salón Elíptico of this neoclassical palace, standing southwest of the city's colonial main square.
Also known as the Capitolio, the Federal Legislative Palace houses Venezuela's National Assembly southwest of Plaza Bolívar. President Antonio Guzmán Blanco had it built between 1872 and 1877 to a design by the architect Luciano Urdaneta. Its Salón Elíptico, the elliptical hall used for formal assembly sessions, opened in 1877 beneath a golden dome. The building remains the seat of Venezuela's legislature.
- The palace is also known as the Capitolio, though it has always housed the legislature rather than a presidency.
Photo: PAULINO MORAN (CC BY-SA 2.0)
History
Caracas was founded in the sixteenth century in a valley separated from the Caribbean by a steep mountain range. Its cathedral, raised in 1674 facing what is now Plaza Bolívar, is the oldest landmark surviving from the colonial town. The buildings that most define the historic center instead date from the 1870s, when President Antonio Guzmán Blanco pursued a program of civic construction: the Federal Legislative Palace, seat of the National Assembly, and the National Pantheon, built over the ruins of a 1744 church to hold the remains of the republic's founding figures. The Pantheon's decoration came in stages, gaining its chandelier in 1883 and a painted vault in the 1930s before a 2013 restoration. Oil wealth later financed the service economy and high-rise construction that now surrounds this nineteenth-century core.