Florida Garden is a unique café, a break from solid modernity, with a majestic, curving staircase descending to the center of the room, two floors, a bar for drinks and a bar for coffee on the go, covered in copper. It was opened in 1962 on the corner of Florida and Paraguay.
Florida Street was initially called Post Office Street. The current name was given by the Directory in 1814 in honor of the national victory won at the Battle of La Florida, in Upper Peru, today’s Bolivia. It has always been the path chosen by the people of the old village to walk from the center to the valleys where the bullring, now known as Plaza San Martín, once operated. Florida is our greatest showcase. Where our historical future is revealed with an open face. He was The social path chosen by Portenius Above is an urban plan that envisioned Avenida de Mayo as a projection of a city that was thought to be European.
Urquiza’s forces paraded along its axis after defeating Rosas at Caseros in 1852. The forces of General Bartolomé Miter had also recently arrived from Paraguay, winners of the War of the Triple Alliance of 1870. Between that year and 1880, elite families chose it to build their palaces. Senilosa, Sommelera, Pellegrini and Torcuato d’Alvear had their homes on Florida Street. Chiefs such as Mitre, Ruka, and Uriburu walked on it daily.
Around 1900 the section between Rivadavia and Corrientes was coded Social hall in Buenos Aires. Sportsman, Águila Confectionery and Rotisserie Charpentier all operate there. It also served as the headquarters of social institutions: the Rural Society, the Jockey Club, the Naval and Military Department, and the Gymnastics and Fencing Club. The references could be endless: the house of Marquita Sánchez de Thompson, the meetings of the Florida Group in Richmond’s Confettiria, the marches of Jorge Luis Borges, the stores of Bon Marché – the current Galerias Pacifico -, Harrods, the Plaza Hotel, the Cavanagh, etc.
Within the various lands that can be seen with the naked eye along Florida Avenue, Florida Park is located in the part that represented what was established, but that was later torn apart and encroached upon. And therein lies, for me, its greatest value. It has become a standard for innovation in an environment that was conservative.
But was it the shareholders’ idea to open a café with these characteristics in that corner of the Retiro? Who was the project engineer? Why did they call it Florida Park?
During the week I went to get answers. I arrived at the café mid-morning on a holiday. I thought I would find out Javier Fernandez, one of the ownersQuieter and available for chat. I had trouble finding a free table. Florida garden does not know the calendar. Always works hard.
Javier is the son of Gobino Fernández, an Asturian who arrived in Buenos Aires in 1953 to work in gastronomy. Jobino started out as a window washer in a bowling alley on Medrano Street. His first salary represented the same salary he would have earned during a year in Spain. That’s how things were. Gobineau Fernandez became manager of the El Reloj candy store in Laval and Maipo. He later became part of the first group of contributors to the Florida Garden. Javier told me that many of the companies set up to run bars and cafes were put together by auctioneers who were interested in different partners who may or may not have known each other from previous managements. For example, in Florida Park, among others, the Fernandez family participated as well as the Bancheros from La Boca. Some entered the business by contributing capital while others did so through labour.
Today Javier is 57 years old. Gobineau and Angela’s son, a Galician from Lugo, became partner and managing director of Florida Park in 1995. With Thirty years in charge of the café It has witnessed several centuries of history passing through its windows. I say good. You already know what the calendar year represents in time in this city and in the country. Javier states, without being able to verify the information with documents, that Florida Park was the first all-glass facility in the city. There is no reason to doubt that. Remember, the café opened in the early 1960s. But also, as if to support the idea of provocation of the project, he points out that the ceiling of the beam is double height. This means that it removes the usual intimacy of those spaces. Moreover, the upper floor does not face the street but rather balconies towards the interior. I ask Javier whether his parents, the Bancheros, or some other partner, among the transgressions mentioned above, were the ones who decided to add Florida Park to the business. “It must have been a joint decision,” he told me. The truth is that there were reasons.
On February 15, 1879 Florida Park. It occupied nearly half of the Florida-Paraguay block. The main entrance was Florida 838. The owning company was Ziegler-Bullrich, but in about 1882, Adolfo Bullrich – yes the company in the yard of the same name – became its sole owner. Florida Park was one of several entertainment halls opened in the city in the second half of the 19th century. It was a business model that offered music and various concerts while customers drank coffee, soft drinks or alcoholic beverages. The Florida Garden has a large central pavilion with a fountain, flower beds and benches facing the box. In 1889, indoors, The historic procession took place that led to the creation of the Youth Civic Union, the predecessor of the well-known UCR.
Florida Park operated until 1910 when it was demolished. The progress of the city that celebrated the first centenary of the May Revolution led to major transformations. In 1912, for example, Harrods began operating in the same building. Without obtaining other information, it can be inferred from the fact on which the owners of Florida Garden relied in choosing this name for the corner.
The name issue has been resolved. The use of English also responds to the canons of the era influenced by the “American tanks” that spread in cinemas, radio stations and television series. It remains to be found out the answers to the other questions I brought to the café.
According to Javier, the Galicians, Asturians and Italians who started Florida Garden came from a gastronomic background. There were no writers, painters, musicians, poets, filmmakers or film directors in the group of companies. Performers. Glimpses of They are used to it And the passers-by who took over the few blocks in Florida between Cordoba and Plaza San Martin.
Let’s put it in context. I repeat that Florida Park was opened in 1962. Shortly after that, the Instituto Di Tella opened, the cultural center that operated just 50 meters from the café. But a year before the release of The Beatles’ first album. Well, we must recognize and appreciate the pioneering courage of this group of immigrants who took on the challenge of opening a paradigm-shattering establishment in a city with an extensive coffee tradition.
It can be said that Florida Garden employees have an average of 25 years of service. Some reach the age of 35 years. Pedro, from Tucuman, continues to work until he is 74 years old. “The house has charm”This is how Javier Fernandez defines coffee. He continues the idea: “The merit belongs to a heterogeneous group of people: founders, employees, and customers.”
Javier’s sentence, but above all the history of the place, made me remember Marcel Duchamp’s famous phrase: “Despite all opinions, it is not the painters who make the paintings, but the spectators.” In this case, it is not necessary or possible to include a list of people who frequent the Florida park. There is enough graphic, audio and visual information representing specific clients. I prefer to sum it up with parishioners who cannot be classified, Federico Manuel Peralta Ramos. His great friend, Pedro Roth, continues to meet friends on Saturday mornings. During my visit, for example, I found… Danielle Santoro Drawing on the table. Without further ado. (Pedro and Daniel are part of the Estrella del Oriente group based in Café Vittorio, which I have already reported on).
In conclusion, there is one last question. Who or what are the architects who designed the café?. Javier didn’t know how to answer, but decided to look for information. A few days later he returned with the information. A very important architectural studio in Buenos Aires, They are used to it Del Jardin asserts that those responsible for the design were probably the architect Eugenio Ponta and the engineer Carlos Succari. Studio Bonta/Sucari was the designer of the Torre Galería Florida or former Air France/Cinzano building – one of the first large buildings in Buenos Aires with a curtain wall facade glazed with aluminum profiles – whose construction was contemporary. There are some common constructive points that support the theory. The investigation is ongoing.
The report received by Javier also shows that the decision to cover the columns with copper panels could have been associated with the technique perfected by the artist Rodolfo Pardi who in those years created more than 400 works of art in the arcades and shops of Buenos Aires.
This is information that is known at the time the note is closed. I love the aura of mystery that surrounds Florida park building design. We may be facing the new Francisco Salamone, but from Buenos Aires. Soon the city was filled with wanderings of curious people looking for his works.
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