Teatro Colón — opera house
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Teatro Colón

  • 1 min read
  • 34.601° S 58.383° W

Interesting facts

  • On 26 June 1910, during a performance of Manon, an anarchist bomb thrown from the upper gallery exploded among the stalls, injuring about ten people.
  • The bomb landed on two empty seats in row 14, and the orchestra calmed the hall by striking up the national anthem.
  • The theatre makes its own productions entirely in-house, with underground workshops for sets, costumes, wigs, props and even shoes.
  • In 1938 the underground floors were extended beneath the neighbouring square and linked to the theatre by a tunnel to house the workshops.
  • The first Teatro Colón of 1857 had a separate gallery set aside for people in mourning.
  • Richard Strauss, Igor Stravinsky and Camille Saint-Saëns all appeared at the theatre during its early decades.
  • The 2006–2010 restoration, first planned at around 25 million dollars, grew to about 100 million and involved some 130 architects and engineers.
  • The building also houses its own training school, the Higher Institute of Art, with an orchestral academy and a children's choir.
  • The theatre has been owned and run by the city of Buenos Aires since 1931.

Why it is worth it

The Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires is one of the great opera houses of the world, and for acoustics it has few equals: in a survey of conductors and musicians carried out by the acoustician Leo Beranek it came out as the best hall for opera anywhere and the second best for concerts. The present building opened on 25 May 1908 with Verdi's "Aida", replacing a first Teatro Colón that had opened in 1857 with "La traviata" and closed in 1888. It was declared a national historic monument in 1991.

Construction dragged on for years and passed through three architects. Francesco Tamburini drew up the design and died in 1891; his pupil Vittorio Meano carried it on until he was murdered in 1904; the Belgian Jules Dormal completed it and gave the decoration a stronger French accent. The horseshoe auditorium seats 2,487, with room for another thousand standing, and rises in tiers of boxes and galleries to a dome painted in 1966 by Raúl Soldi, from whose centre hangs a chandelier of some 700 lights. The building has six floors above ground and three below, and its stage is some 20 m wide and 20 m deep.

Toscanini conducted here; Caruso, Callas, Nijinsky, Pavarotti and Plácido Domingo performed on its stage. After a long and troubled restoration, a three-year project involving some 1,500 workers, the theatre came back to life on 24 May 2010. The building fills a whole city block bounded by the broad Avenida 9 de Julio and the streets Libertad, Tucumán and Toscanini; its main entrance is on Calle Libertad.

Getting there

The theatre stands in central Buenos Aires, a short walk from the Tribunales – Teatro Colón station of the Subte. The city airport, Aeroparque Jorge Newbery (AEP), is about 6 km away; most long-haul flights use Ezeiza International Airport.

Plan your visit

We have no confirmed visit data yet. Once it is confirmed, this block also carries the date it was checked.

Nearby places

On these lists

The Most Beautiful Places in Buenos Aires 5The Most Beautiful Places in Argentina 27The Most Beautiful Modern Opera Houses 7The Most Beautiful Opera Houses 21The Most Beautiful Modern Buildings 50The Most Beautiful Buildings 286

From the encyclopaedia

The Teatro Colón is a historic opera house in Buenos Aires, Argentina. It is considered one of the ten best opera houses in the world by National Geographic. According to a survey carried out by the acoustics expert Leo Beranek among leading international opera and orchestra directors, the Teatro Colón has the room with the best acoustics for opera and the second best for concerts in the world.

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