Palacio de Valdés-Bazán: A Rural Noble Residence in Asturias
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.4
- Popularity
- Low
- Country
- Spain
- Primary era
- Early Modern
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Early Modern
- Civilizations
- Crown of Castile, Spanish
- Site type
- Domestic
- Remains
- Elite Residence
On this page9 sections
History
Origins and eighteenth-century reform
Palacio de Valdés-Bazán is a sixteenth-century rural noble residence in Spain, located in San Román de Candamo, Asturias. It is also known as the Palace of the Cuervo-Arango family and the Palace of the Counts of Reparaz. Two major reforms, carried out in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, produced the building’s present configuration.
The construction history can be understood through two principal phases. A primitive phase, tentatively assigned to the seventeenth century from the dimensions of openings that appear unaltered, comprised the basic building, the east facade, the later-remodeled north facade, and about 80 percent of the inhabited area. The eighteenth-century work repaired the north facade, added heraldic shields, probably covered the older walls with plaster, and attached the southern gallery to the earlier structure without demolishing its walls.
Fernando Antonio de Valdés y Quirós, an eighteenth-century Spanish nobleman and officeholder, carried out the major later reform. He enlarged the house and gave greater distinction to what had previously been a comparatively simple building. The work introduced the Valdés and Cuervo arms on the principal facade. The shields probably belong to the second half of the eighteenth century, since they include the ravens that Fernando Valdés-Quirós added to the family arms. Despite the changes, the house retained an austere and severe architectural language.
Hereditary ownership and later history
For more than four centuries, extending into the twentieth century, the house passed by inheritance through the descendants of its founders. Ownership successively belonged to the Cuervo-Arango, Quirós, Valdés, Ríos, Armada, and Melgarejo lineages. The Armada family held the titles of Counts of Revillagigedo and Marquises of Rivadulla, while the Melgarejo family held the title of Counts of Reparaz.
Gaspar Melchor de Jovellanos, an eighteenth-century Spanish writer, jurist, and statesman, described the house in his diaries during the final years of that century. At that time, vineyards and fruit trees surrounded the residence. The hereditary line ended with María del Perpetuo Socorro Armada y Comyn, after which the palace became municipal property late in the twentieth century.
Remains
Layout and construction
The palace stands at one end of San Román de Candamo, beside the road and within a large estate. Its rectangular plan follows the site’s topography. The lower part has two levels, while the higher part has one, and the building has no interior courtyard. A three-pitched roof follows the uneven terrain. From the village, the north and east facades resemble traditional local houses, reinforcing the building’s rural character.
Principal facades
North facade
The north facade is the principal facade. Its plain walls use rendered small-block masonry, meaning relatively small stones covered with render, while large dressed corner stones strengthen and define the angles. Two heraldic shields probably dating from the second half of the eighteenth century are set irregularly on either side of the central area. Small moldings extend the window sills and provide the facade’s only decoration.
Two doorways open at ground level. One apparently served as the main entrance, and the other gave access to the stables. A doorway on the upper level led to the caretakers’ residence, distinguishing the noble household from the accommodation of its employees. In the principal residential section, regularly spaced windows are emphasized by a central balcony above the doorway. This balcony was a deliberately simple imitation of a balcony of homage, a ceremonial feature associated with the formal presentation of a noble residence.
A smaller row of windows aligns vertically with one side of the principal-floor windows, creating an asymmetrical composition. The higher section has more closely spaced openings and a small staircase, but remains highly austere.
South gallery
The palace’s principal architectural feature is the double arcade on the south facade. It occupies both stories and covers slightly more than half of the south facade, continuing across half of the west facade. The lower level consists of large rectangular pillars supporting low three-centered arches, which are low arches formed from three connected curved sections. Their outer curves are regularly shaped, and they are set between carefully dressed stone spandrels, the roughly triangular areas between the arches and their surrounding frames. Slightly projecting rectangular moldings separate the arches.
A half-round molding, or semicircular projecting strip, divides the two levels of the porticoed section and casts a narrow horizontal shadow. The upper arcade repeats the pattern of the lower openings, but its pillars are replaced by cylindrical columns made from two stone blocks. Each column has a capital formed from a rusticated ashlar block, from which an arch of similar form begins.
The upper arcade has irregularly distributed, fully dressed stonework in its spandrels and a plain stone balustrade between the columns. Its cornice consists of another half-round molding and supports the wooden roof structure. The timber follows traditional local methods in its squared wooden members and projecting roof elements.
East and west facades
The east facade has no decorative elements and resembles the popular buildings around it. Its openings are arranged asymmetrically, like those of the north facade. The west facade combines the gallery system of the south facade with the arrangement of the north facade and introduces no additional distinctive feature.
Across the building, the composition is geometrically irregular and rigorously austere. The unevenness reaches the noble section itself, where the dimensions of the arcades are not completely uniform. Together with the rendered masonry, dressed stonework, timber roof, and topographically adapted plan, this gives the palace its marked rural character.
