Habana Vieja

Habana Vieja (Old Havana) is the city-center and one of the 15 boroughs forming Havana, Cuba. It has the second highest population density in the city and contains the core of the original city of Havana. The positions of the original Havana city walls are the modern boundaries of Old Havana.

With architecture that spans five centuries, Old Havana enchants visitors with one of the finest ensembles of urban edifices in the Americas. Old Havana contains over 900 buildings of historical importance, with a myriad of 17th-century baroque and 19th-century neoclassical architectural examples.

The colonial city, once enclosed by a wall, measures 25 blocks north-south by 13 blocks east-west. Today, Old Havana is considered to include the streets immediately west of the old wall, which ran along today's Avenida de los Misiones (Monserrate) and Avenida de Bélgica (Egido). The area extends to the Paseo de Martí, Parque Central, and the Capitolio.

Main sights include:

• Malecón: avenue that runs along the seawall at the northern shore of Havana
• Paseo del Prado: street that forms the western edge of Old Havana
• Castillo del Morro: fortress guarding the entrance to Havana bay
• La Cabaña: fortress located on the east side of Havana Bay
• San Salvador de la Punta Fortress: on the shore opposite the Castle of El Morro
• Castillo de la Real Fuerza: first large fortification of the city
• Catedral de San Cristóbal: most prominent building on the Plaza de la Catedral
• National Capitol: styled after the Panthéon in Paris, resembles the U.S. Capitol.
• Galician Center: established as a social club for Galician emigrants
• Plaza de Armas: main touristic square
• Gran Teatro de la Havana: theater famous for the acclaimed National Ballet of Cuba
• Museum of the Revolution: in the former Presidential Palace
• San Francisco de la Habana Basilica: church and convent of San Francisco de Asis

Old Havana and its Fortification System

The Old Havana and its Fortification System is a World Heritage site that includes an urban layout with five large plazas, a harmonious ensemble of architectural monuments, traditional-style popular buildings from different periods in its history, as well as an extensive network of fortifications.

Havana, founded in 1519 by the Spanish on Cuba's northwestern shore, became one of the Caribbean's main centers for shipbuilding. Its old center retains a mix of Baroque and neoclassical monuments and its defensive installations includes some of the oldest and largest stone fortifications now standing in the Americas.

Although it is today a sprawling metropolis of 2 million inhabitants, Havana's old center retains an interesting mix of Baroque and neoclassical monuments, and a homogeneous ensemble of private houses with arcades, balconies, wrought-iron gates and internal courtyards.

Old Havana has maintained a remarkable unity of character through its adherence to its original urban layout. Urban plazas surrounded by many buildings of outstanding architectural merit and narrow streets lined with more popular or traditional styles permeate the historic center of the city.

Its overall sense of architectural, historical and environmental continuity makes it the most impressive historical city center in the Caribbean and one of the most notable in the American continent as a whole.

With the establishment and development of the fleet system in the Spanish West Indies, Havana in the second half of the 16th century became the largest port in the region, and in the 18th century developed the most complete dockyard in the New World, both of which necessitated military protection.

The extensive network of defensive installations that was created between the 16th and 19th centuries includes some of the oldest and largest stone fortifications now standing in the Americas.

Old Havana, which is defined by the extent of the former city walls, has maintained the pattern of the early urban setting with its five large plazas, each with its own architectural character:

• Plaza de Armas
• Plaza Vieja
• Plaza de San Francisco
• Plaza del Cristo
• Plaza de la Catedral

Around these plazas are many outstanding buildings:

• Iglesia Catedral de La Habana
• Antiguo Convento de San Francisco de Asís
• Palacio del Segundo Cabo
• Palacio de los Capitanes Generales

Interspersed with this mix of baroque and neoclassical style monuments is a homogeneous ensemble of private houses with arcades, balconies, wrought-iron gates and internal courtyards, many of them evocatively time-worn.

The complex system of fortifications that protected Havana, its port and its dockyard is comprised of:

• Fortaleza de San Carlos de la Cabaña: one of the largest colonial fortresses in the Americas, on the east side of the narrow entrance canal to Havana Bay
• Castillo de la Real Fuerza: one of the oldest colonial fortresses in the Americas (begun in 1558), on the west side of the canal
• Castillo de San Salvador de la Punta and Castillo de los Tres Reyes del Morro: guarding the entrance to the canal

as well as:

• Torreón de San Lázaro
• Castillo de Santa Dorotea de Luna de la Chorrera
• Reducto de Cojímar
• Baluarte del Ángel
• Lienzo de la Muralla y Puerta de la Tenaza
• Restos de Lienzo de la Muralla
• Garita de la Maestranza
• Cuerpo de Guardia de la Puerta Nueva
• Restos del Baluarte de Paula
• Polvorín de San Antonio
• Hornabeque de San Diego
• Fuerte No. 4
• Castillo de Santo Domingo de Atarés
• Castillo del Príncipe
• Fuerte No. 1