After leaving Plaza de la Constitucion today, Asya, Serena and I went to La Chascona (the Pablo Neruda house in Santiago). It’s at the base of Cerro San Cristobal and the end of the Bellavista barrio. The house is actually three separate buildings, one along the street and two on the hillside. The house has a maritime language with porthole windows, creaky wooden floors, metal ship-like railings, and a primarily blue color scheme with yellow accents. The entrance courtyard to the house is situated at the first level of the guest house (the street-facing building) and you can either enter the guest house or take the stairs to the main house. In the guest house is a bar and dining room on the first floor with a secret passageway to a guest suite above. The guest suite opens to the upper level of the garden. From there, you go up to the main house. This is a two story building, the lower floor is the living room and a dining nook and the upper floor is the bedroom (which is inaccessible to visitors). The fireplace in the living room placed in the corner and is rounded to mimic the rounded shape of the façade. Natural wood is also used in several places, most notably as a column dividing the space. The fireplace is white and the walls are stone. From the main house, you travel up a series of winding steps to the library (and another bar). An interesting note is that the fireplace in this room has the same rounded form as the one in the living room, however it is made of stone and the adjacent wall is white (an inverse from the materiality in the living room). The “France Room” as it is called (I am not sure of its original function, it’s currently a gallery of some if Neruda’s works and photos) is at the end of the library and a large window looks out over the hillside and out towards the city.
View of the fireplace in the living room