The park of Seville.

Palace gardens

The grounds of the actual park were once the private garden of the dukes of Montpensier, who were based in the palace of San Telmo. Its name comes from the Duchess Maria Luisa Fernanda who, when widowed, gave it to the city in 1893 for their conversion into a public space.

After years of disuse, in 1909 it began to take hold the idea of a great exhibition in the style of those celebrated in Europe to commemorate the centenary of the independence of Latin American countries and to unite the bonds with them. The park would belong to the location of the project and as such the renovation started for the Ibero-Americano exhibition which was finally celebrated in 1929.

A park-museum

With an extension of 34 hectares, the person in charge of transforming some palace gardens into an open space for the public as part of an ambitious exhibition, was the landscape gardener Jean Claude Nicolas Forestier. His expertise is reflected by not inserting French classicism to the park, but rather adapting to the idiosyncrasies of the city, equipping it with numerous monumental spaces, many of those made with a base of ceramics.

And so the park is filled with special places to see, spaces that pay homage to celebrated Spanish people, bowers and canals. It’s built with paths which have their own names that facilitate the walk and discovering these charming corners.

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The Fountain of Frogs, the Gurugu Hill or the Becquer Roundabout cannot be missed.  In the American Square there are the former pavilions of Fine Art and Mudejar, now the Archaeological and the Arts and Popular Customs Museums.

There’s no need to say that this park is a favourite of the Sevillians, a place to wander and to relax in one of the corners that this special space offers.

Images sources: 83 – 90 (section 2)