Avenida de Méjico

A central avenue of the Retiro Park named after the Republic of Mexico, part of the council’s policy of dedicating the park’s inner paths to Spanish American republics after the park passed to the city in 1868. The present landscaping is the work of Cecilio Rodríguez (1940).

Avenida de Méjico, which many still call Paseo de México, crosses the Retiro from the Puerta de la Independencia to the Galápagos Fountain. Its entrance gateway of granite and wrought iron was raised by José Urioste y Velada between 1885 and 1886, reusing columns from the old Casino de la Reina. Between the two landmarks the avenue spreads two central flowerbeds flanked by silver poplars and myrtles. The name belongs to a family of inner promenades christened after American republics. The custom took hold after 1868, when the state handed the park to the city council, amid the Spanish American fervour of the late nineteenth century. No record survives fixing the exact date of the sign. Cecilio Rodríguez, head gardener of the Retiro from 1914, drew up in 1940 the landscaping we see today, with its entrance plaza and stairways. In 2021 the ensemble of the Paseo del Prado and the Retiro was declared a World Heritage Site, and this avenue fell within the protected area.

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