Juan Ponce de León Residence | Casa Blanca

res­i­den­cia-de-juan-ponce-de-leon-la-casa-blan­ca

Casa Blan­ca. Click on image to see it larger.

A few steps fur­ther up the street from Euge­nio María de Hos­tos Square you’ll arrive at the old­est con­tin­u­ous­ly occu­pied res­i­dence in the West­ern Hemi­sphere.  In 1521, the Span­ish colo­nial gov­ern­ment start­ed con­struc­tion of the “Casa Blan­ca” or white house to be the offi­cial res­i­dence of gov­er­nor Juan Ponce de León and the Island’s first stone fort.

The gov­er­nor died that same year in Cuba, after being mor­tal­ly wound­ed while attempt­ing to estab­lish a colony near the Caloosa­hatch­ee riv­er in Flori­da.  The Ponce de León fam­i­ly occu­pied La Casa Blan­ca for over 250 years until the Span­ish mil­i­tary took over the facil­i­ties in 1779.  After the US inva­sion in 1998, the Casa Blan­ca became the offi­cial res­i­dence of the US Mil­i­tary Com­man­ders until it was returned to the peo­ple of Puer­to Rico in 1966.

Two stone lions and the family’s coat of arms over the mas­sive wood­en doors adorn the entrance to this beau­ti­ful build­ing.  The white stuc­co dwelling is com­prised of a foy­er, study, two bed­rooms, a din­ing room, kitchen, ora­to­rio, gar­den, orchard, and a spe­cial throne room for receiv­ing roy­al visits.

Today the com­plex serves as a Nation­al His­toric Mon­u­ment and hous­es a muse­um about life on the Island dur­ing the 16th, 17th and 18th Cen­turies.  Each room is dec­o­rat­ed using antique Span­ish fur­ni­ture to rep­re­sent the building’s dif­fer­ent his­tor­i­cal peri­ods as authen­ti­cal­ly as pos­si­ble.  The Casa Blan­ca grounds are present­ly under­go­ing an exten­sive restora­tion to return them to the lus­cious gar­den atmos­phere that char­ac­ter­ized them for cen­turies.  One spe­cial fea­ture is the gar­den foun­tain, which was inspired on the famous Alham­bra cas­tle in Grana­da, Spain.

La Casa Blan­ca is locat­ed at 1 Calle San Sebastián, one of the most famous streets in Old San Juan, and its open to the pub­lic Wednes­days thru Sun­day, from 8:30 in the morn­ing to 4:30 in the after­noon.  Tours are avail­able by appoint­ment at a nom­i­nal cost of $5 for adults and $3 for chil­dren, stu­dents and seniors.  For infor­ma­tion, please cal 787–725-1454.

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