San Cristóbal de La Laguna

The City That Designed the New World

San Cristóbal de La Laguna is much more than a beautiful city: it is the city that served as a model for the urban layout of colonial cities in America. Founded in 1496, it was the first non-fortified city in the Canary Islands, designed with an innovative grid plan that was later replicated in Havana, Lima, and Cartagena de Indias. This universal value earned it the designation of a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1999.

Strolling through La Laguna is like walking through a catalog of pure Canary colonial architecture. San Agustín Street is home to the most notable palaces: the Palacio de Nava, with its baroque facade of volcanic stone; the Casa de los Capitanes Generales; and the Palacio de Lercaro, now the headquarters of the Museum of History of Tenerife, where they say the ghost of a young woman who committed suicide for love still roams the halls.

University and Nightlife City

The University of La Laguna, founded in 1792, is the oldest in the Canary Islands and gives the city its young and vibrant character. Thousands of students enliven the streets, fill the tapas bars on Calle Herradores and Calle del Agua, and turn Thursday to Saturday nights into a continuous party that contrasts with the daytime solemnity of the palaces and convents.

The churches of La Laguna are a little-known treasure: the Church of the Conception, with its Mudejar tower visible from all over the city; the convent of Santa Catalina, where cloistered nuns sell sweets through a turnstile; and the Cathedral, whose sober neo-Gothic facade hides a surprisingly bright interior. Each tells a chapter of the five centuries of history of this unique city.

La Laguna is the living memory of the Canary Islands: a city where the colonial past coexists with university energy and where every palace has a story to tell.