Blas del Campo House

Santa Cruz de Tenerife · Category: Memory · Subcategory: Sites of memory · Year: 1754

In the upper part of Plaza de la Candelaria, at the corner with Cruz Verde street (formerly Las Tiendas), there was a magnificent building of traditional Canarian character. It was built around 1754 at the behest of Blas del Campo, a wealthy shipowner who became the royal mayor of the town at the beginning of the 1760s.

The building was a marked example of extraordinary construction skill. It had a sober appearance and elegant proportionality in its openings and walls. Its main façade faced Las Tiendas street, which was actually the busiest commercial street in the city at that time. Here the building appeared to have two storeys; since the small windows above the doors barely indicated the second floor, giving greater proportion and elegance to the façade which, in its sloping run along the street, featured an interesting Canarian balcony.

Inside, it had a spacious courtyard where three pinewood columns with capitals supported the galleries facing north and west; the third column was embedded in the landing of a single-flight staircase without a wall and open to the back of the courtyard.

In the ground floor hall of this house a provisions warehouse was installed, which was raided by English troops who landed in the early hours of 25 July 1797. The invaders’ objective was to force the food deputies Antonio Power and Luis Fonspertius, who were taking refuge there, to act as translators and accompany a British sergeant who delivered an arrogant ultimatum to General Gutiérrez. The Spanish officer, once he heard the message, immediately ignored it and arrested the British sergeant.

In those same premises, by 1886, Santiago Ladeveze opened a prestigious commercial establishment with the latest fashion articles from Paris.

Ultimately, the house commissioned by Blas del Campo in the mid-18th century was demolished in the early 1970s to make way for a nine-storey building.

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