Sightseeing in Cuenca

The oblong Plaza Mayor is little more than a gently declining open space in the center of the old city. It lacks the structural indicators of a master-planned medieval town square that would have four uniformed façades atop a ground floor arcade and a statue in the center. As with the narrow and unaligned roads and the misshapen houses throughout Cuenca, it adheres to the rock and conforms to its shape. It does have what the others are lacking, a crisp, unimpeded view of the town’s most impressive architectural and cultural relic, the Catedral.

Cuenca's La Catedral

Built during the 12th and 13th centuries, Cuenca’s cathedral evokes the transition from Romanesque to Gothic and is the earliest example of the latter to be found in Spain (architectural know-it-alls also point out that the Catedral’s heavily ornamented transept, vaults and polygonal apse have a unique Anglo-Norman influence). The newer façade that immediately presents itself from the plaza has a troubled history. In the 18th century it partially collapsed for the first time. It was repaired with Baroque touches and then, in 1902, the Moorish Giraldillo tower, the only remnant of the Moorish mosque that had once occupied the spot, collapsed. It took the repaired façade with it. The neo-Gothic one you see today was begun in 1910 and nobody knows when or if it will ever be completed.

The 13th-century Palacio Episcopal (Bishop’s Palace) houses the Museo Diocesano-Catedralicio. The museum displays a varied collection of art dating from the 15th to 18th centuries, when the city of Cuenca was prospering through its wool and textile trade. In addition to the liturgical relics, there are a few paintings by El Greco, sculptures and examples of traditional Cuenca crafts.

Across the Calle del Obispo Valero from the Diocesan museum is the Museo Arqueológico. This archeological museum is filled with discoveries from the province, dating from prehistory to medieval times. The 16th-century building it occupies was once the city’s granary.

At the termination of the Calle del Obispo Valero, you’ll reach the Casas Colgadas, Cuenca’s famous trademarks. These hanging houses are of plaster and wood construction and date to the 14th century. They rise from the face of the gorge like a natural extension of it, with overhanging eaves and stacked balconies long supported by sturdy cantilevers that have kept them from crashing into the river below. Here, overlooking the Huécar gorge, are the most attractive and intact examples of such houses to be found in Cuenca. For a picture-perfect opportunity, follow the slanted road beneath them down to the Puente San Pablo, a footbridge over the River Huécar that offers the best views of these curious façades.

During the last century the Casas Colgadas have been renovated and in 1966 the spectacular Museo de Arte Abstraco Español was established within them. The painter and collector Fernando Zóbel can be credited with creating this world-class museum during a period when Spain’s artists were once again growing bold and successful despite the lingering pall of Franco’s dictatorship. In speaking to the writer James Michener in the 1960s while he was researching what would be his unequivocal and authoritative book on Spain, Iberia, Zóbel said, “Tell your friends who may be interested that these men are as good as Picasso and Miró were when they began.” They are, among others, the painters Antoni Tápies, Mompó, Tormer, Canogar and Zóbel himself. Sculptors include Eduardo Chillida, Oteiza, Chirimo and Serrano, whose works decorate the angulated spaces and vast exhibition salons between numerous flights of stairs rising through coffered Mudéjar ceilings. All are lighted by Gothic lattice windows that look out into the air of the gorge above the river.

Cuenca's Other Sights and Attractions

At the opposite end of the old city from the Casas Colgadas is the Torre Mangana. To reach it, follow the Calle de Santa María out of the Plaza Mayor. This tall, unadorned tower stands as solitary proof of the Arab fortress it once was part of. Today it serves as the city’s clock tower. En route to the tower from the plaza, you’ll pass by the Museo de Las Ciencas (open Mon.-Sat. 10 am-2 pm and 4-7 pm, Sun. 10 am-2 pm), a decidedly contemporary structure set amid, and in contrast to, the old city architecture left behind in this quarter by the Moors. One street over, on Calle Alfonso VIII, you can admire a row of palaces built with the return of the conquistadors from the New World when their coffers were heavy with riches.