Avenida de Felipe II
The avenue takes its name from Philip II (Valladolid, 1527 – El Escorial, 1598), king of Spain, who on 8 May 1561 permanently established the court in Madrid. It already existed in the Ensanche planned from 1860 as the Avenue of the Bullring, ending at the Fuente del Berro ring (1874-1934). The Franco-era street plan renamed it after the king in 1939.
The avenida de Felipe II began as the road that led to the bulls. At its far end stood the Fuente del Berro Bullring, Madrid’s second major ring, in Neo-Mudéjar style, which opened in 1874 and held on until 1934, when the fans moved to Las Ventas.
The layout came from the Ensanche devised by Carlos María de Castro in 1860. The name took its time to settle: during the Second Republic the street honored Francisco Ferrer, the educator shot in 1909. In 1939 the Franco regime erased that sign and put up the king’s, Philip II, who took the crown in 1556.
Today none of that smells of arena dust. The avenida de Felipe II is a quiet pedestrian promenade between calle de Goya and calle de Jorge Juan. And on the plot where the bullring once stood now rises the Movistar Arena, which was born in 1960 as the Palacio de los Deportes.
Its names
- Avenida de la Plaza de Torosc. 1874-1930s
- Calle de Francisco Ferrerc. 1931-1939
- Avenida de Felipe II1939-actualidad