General García-Escámez Neighbourhood

Santa Cruz de Tenerife · Category: Architecture · Subcategory: Squares, streets & markets · Year: 1946 · Authors: Enrique Rumeu de Armas

The García Escámez neighbourhood is located in the southwest sector of the municipality, within the administrative district Ofra-Costa Sur. It borders to the north with the neighbourhoods of Tío Pino and Somosierra, to the west with Tristán and Miramar, and to the east and south with the northern motorway.  

This neighbourhood emerged in the mid-1940s, in the midst of the Spanish post-war period, when the Captain General of the Canary Islands Francisco García-Escámez e Iniesta, head of the Economic Command of the Archipelago at that time, personally took charge of obtaining the necessary funds in Madrid for the project's execution, with the idea of partially solving the enormous housing problem in the city. It should be noted that this urban complex was the largest work carried out in the Archipelago by the Economic Command of the Canary Islands.  

The idea of building the neighbourhood was outlined in September 1941, when the City Council agreed to cede the plots located on the "La Abejera" estate, an area situated between the main southern road and the projected "Santa Cruz-La Laguna" motorway. The land was oriented towards the southern coast between the volcanic cones of Ofra and Taco.

The project for the neighbourhood, drafted by the architect Enrique Rumeu de Armas, was approved in November 1944. It was designed with a total of 201 homes which later became 301; in addition to a church, parish house, school groups, teachers' housing, cinema, gardens, sports field, market, shops, own trades, etc. A whole small autonomous town or village. The houses combined several types, from single-family one-storey homes, through duplexes, to two-storey blocks for two families; all framed within a Canarian regional style with baroque touches, an aesthetic widely used at that time. Construction began at the start of 1945, with the entire complex inaugurated the following year. 

Access to the development is through an arch with the inscription "BARRIADA GENERAL GARCÍA-ESCÁMEZ", and in its keystone we find the municipal coat of arms, all crowned by two battlements. This access arch is defined on both sides by stair sections leading to the arcades of the neighbourhood's central square, the true civic centre of the place. 

Today the neighbourhood has notable civic activity, also featuring two relevant elements from an artistic-cultural point of view: the church of San Fernando Rey and the La Abejera market (better known as the Iron Market).

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