Santa Cruz Palace

The Palacio de Santa Cruz or Palace of the Holy Cross is a baroque building in central Madrid, Spain. It now houses the Spanish Foreign Ministry. It was used as a jail until the reign of Philip IV of Spain, when it was converted into a palace.

Construction was commissioned in 1629 by Philip IV to house both courts and jail facilities. The architect Juan Gómez de Mora worked on it from 1629 to 1636, and later other architects like José de Villareal, Bartolomé Hurtado García, and José del Olmo added elements.

In 1767 it changed from jail to the Palacio de Santa Cruz, due to its proximity to the church of Santa Cruz. A fire destroyed all but the facade in 1791.

Text adapted from “Santa Cruz Palace, Madrid” on Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Santa Cruz Palace ranks #2,147 of 7,738 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking, and #79 of the 600 mapped in Spain. Founded 1629, it is older than 29% of the atlas's dated landmarks — one of 580 atlas entries founded in the 17th century. Its Wikipedia articles were opened 1,319 times in the last 60 days, more than 56% of the atlas. 17 more atlas landmarks stand within 25 km. The nearest day-trip guide is Madrid, 1 km away. See how Spain compares in the castle statistics.

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Read the full history on Wikipedia ↗