La Casa Mínima: a small space full of history

Buenos Aires is full of corners, small details, wonders hidden from everyone's sight. San Telmo is undoubtedly one of the most magical neighborhoods in the city, and houses a small treasure:  Casa Mínima. 

Located in Pasaje San Lorenzo 380 — in an environment where the cobblestone regulates the speed of the few passing cars and transforms that block into an oasis of silence — the particular thing about this house is that it has the narrowest facade of the city: its front is only 2.5 meters wide.

Its construction dates from the beginning of the nineteenth century and is a residual space that remained after the successive building reforms that suffered the block. That's the formal story. The myth, meanwhile, says that it was the house of a liberto slave, to whom his master had given that space to build his home.

According to legend, in 1813, after freedom of bellies was declared, slaves were faced with the need to obtain their own home and, on many occasions, their former owners provided small land for them to use for this purpose, in gratitude for the services provided.

It is not known for sure whether this was so, which makes it even more wonderful. It remains in our imagination, then, to believe what was the initial purpose of this little house; to close our eyes and visualize a Buenos Aires in the 1800, where — with that bit of apple — a slave knew, for the first time, what freedom was. What are you waiting for to get close to know that part of our history?

Photo: Courtesy Entity of Tourism of the City of Buenos Aires: travel.buenosaires.gob.ar