Pasaje Doré

Lavapiés·Embajadores

The passage opened around 1897–1898, when the Hospital de San Juan de Dios that occupied the plot between Atocha and Santa Isabel streets was demolished. The name comes, according to the most widespread version, from the French illustrator Paul Gustave Doré (1832–1883), whose “Journey through Spain” with Baron Davillier circulated widely in 19th-century Spain. A rival theory holds that the original name was Cine DO-RE, hyphenated, alluding to the first two musical notes: in 1964 photographs the cinema’s sign appears with the hyphen. Sources do not fully agree.

The Pasaje Doré connects calle de Atocha with calle de Santa Isabel, in the heart of Lavapiés, behind the Antón Martín market. It is a straight lane barely a hundred metres long, yet its name carries the memory of one of the most film-loving corners of Madrid. Before the passage, the Hospital de San Juan de Dios stood here, founded in 1552. When the hospital moved in 1897 the old pile was demolished, and the freed plot made room for this lane. The name was fixed by the Salón Doré, a variety hall opened in 1912 that combined a shopping passage, a cinema shed, a garden and a theatre-café. In 1922 the definitive Cine Doré building went up, with a Modernist façade and seating for 1,250. It fell in standing until locals dubbed it the Palace of the Sunflower Seeds, and it closed in 1963. The city bought it and in 1989 it reopened as the home of the Spanish Film Archive, a role it keeps today.

Its names

  • Solar del Hospital de San Juan de Dios1552-1897
  • Pasaje Doré / Pasaje DO-REc. 1897-presente
Sources (10)

Crossings