Lisbon - Baixa and Rossio Travel Guides | Lisbon | Sub Regions | Lisbon - Baixa and Rossio

Downtown Lisbon is pure theatre; the commercial heart and microcosm of the city. Set against a prosaic backdrop of banks, budget hotels and generic brand names, the Baixa’s central square, Rossio, and its more antiquarian side-kick Praça da Figueira, provide some of the best free entertainment in the city. All Lisbon’s masses seem to drift across Rossio’s undulating mosaic paving. More nonchalant, Praça da Figueira reveals time-defying rituals and giant yuccas hang from the rafters of hole-in-the-wall grocers.

Southbound from Rossio, Rua Augusta is the main pedestrian thoroughfare, lined with touristy pavement cafés, international chain stores and leather emporiums, populated by quirky puppeteers, buskers and gilded and ghostly human statues. This climaxes with the over- arching splendour of the Arco de Vitória, gateway to Praça do Comércio, designed to out-pomp the most regal of Europe’s squares.

Sights

Surrounded by whizzing traffic, all roads seem to lead to Rossio. Designed by Carlos Mardel and Eugénio dos Santos, it was formally known as Praça Dom Pedro IV, and is Lisbon’s most vibrant square. Former site of a Roman Hippodrome and the setting for bullfights and the burning of heretics during the Middle Ages, Rossio now hosts a spectacle of a different kind. The epicentre of downtown life, here you can buy lottery tickets, a bunny rabbit, change money, pay homage to the Big Mac alongside Lisbon’s international youth or muse with the avant garde over shuddering bicas (strong espressos) in art deco coffee shops, like the iconic Café Nicola or Pastelaria Suiça.

The neoclassical Teatro Nacional de Dona Maria II, built in 1846 by Fortunato Lodi, occupies the north side of the square. Surmounted by a sculpture of Portuguese playwright Gil Vicente, it provides a lofty grandeur to Rossio’s populist frisson. During the 18th century this was the site of the Palace of the Inquisition, where in 1761 the sentences of the auto da fés were meted out. In the centre of the square stands the 27-m high statue of Dom Pedro IV, the emperor of Brazil before ascending the Portuguese crown in 1826. The marble pedestal features figures representing Justice, Strength, Prudence and Temperence. Legend has it that the statue, sculpted in France by Elias Robert in 1870, was not in fact Dom Pedro at all, but Emperor Maximilian of Mexico. It is claimed the statue was making a stopover in Lisbon, en route from France to Mexico, when the news broke that Maximilian had been assassinated. Due to an uncanny likeness, it was decided that the statue of Maximilian would serve as Dom Pedro and a deal was brokered.

To the northwest stands the interlocking horseshoe arches of Rossio station. Designed in 1887, this neo-Manueline confection characterized a late 19th-century nostalgia for the period of the Discoveries, when Portuguese maritime power reached its zenith. Pass though the arched gateway on Rossio to Rua dos Sapateiros to see one of Lisbon’s remaining examples of art nouveau, the old movie house, the Animatógrafo, which is now a sleazy strip club.

Adjacent to Rossio, Praça da Figueira retains more endearing old world charm. Alongside ornate seed shops, fish hang in giant salted sheaves from old-fashioned shops and lottery sellers, hash peddlers and backpackers mill around budget pensãos. A pivotal transport nexus, the square was given a nip and tuck in time for Expo 98. Well on the tourist trail, Pastelaria Suiça joins the two squares – the outdoor terrace is one of the best vantage points to survey the action against the spectacular backdrop of the castle. The statue of Dom João I, usually mobbed by irreverent pigeons, forms the nevertheless dignified centrepiece. On the south side, the charmingly old-fashioned Confeitaria Nacional was considered to be one of Europe’s most elegant salons when it opened in 1829, its saliva-inducing window displays now include fine pastries, cakes smothered in cream and shiny brioches the size of beach balls.

Northeast of Praça da Figueira, Praça Martim Moniz – an ugly urban wasteland where the city gates once stood – honours the eponymous knight who, during the sacking of Lisbon in 1147, tied himself to the castle gateway so that Dom Afonso Henríques’ crusaders could take the city from the Moors.

While hardly a beauty, Baixa oozes life, its old world poetry injected with modern fizz. Rua Augusta is the main tourist parade ground and the inevitable starting point for a stroll. Alongside the golden arabesque swirls of art nouveau store fronts, knots of grizzled old men read the papers hung at corner kiosks and tourists settle in at premium-rate pavement cafés watching a carousel of buskers, street artists and the ubiquitous Peruvian pan pipers.

In the 19th century, Baixa was Lisbon’s commercial heart, with streets named according to their trades – Rua dos Sapateiros, the shoemakers’ street, Rua da Prata, silversmiths’ street, and Rua Augusta, August Street, was for the wool and silk merchants.

Beneath the Banco Comércial Português, the Núcleo Arqueológico, Rua dos Correeiros, 9, T 21 321 7000, Thu 1500-1700, Sat 1000-1200, 1500-1700, free, guided tours only (available in English if you call to arrange a visit in advance), displays artefacts from the first to the 18th century, uncovered during renovation work on the bank and subsequent excavation.

A feat of kinetic eccentricity, the Gothic Eiffel-esque Elevador de Santa Justa, Rua de Santa Justa, Oct-Apr 0900-1900, May-Sep 0830-2230, E1, is one of Lisbon’s most iconic and memorable images. Designed by an apostle of Eiffel, Raoul Mesnier du Ponsard, who also designed Lisbon’s other three remaining elevadores, it was inaugurated in 1902. Originally powered by steam, the 45-m vertical wrought-iron structure was built to link the Baixa with Largo do Carmo, via a 25-m walkway. Ongoing building works mean that the walkway’s exit, leading to Chiado, is closed but from the café panoramic views reveal the city below. Walking down Rua Aurea, at number 82, the Banco de Totta e Açores was an act of architectural insurrection. Built by the prestigious architect Ventura Terra in 1905, its classical style defies the trite constructions that characterized Baixa Pombalina.

Often described as Lisbon’s reception room, Praça do Comércio is to Lisbon what Place de la Concorde is to Paris and what Plaza Mayor is to Madrid. Formally known as Terreiro do Paço, after the sumptous royal palace – Palácio do Ribeira – which stood here until the earthquake of 1755, the city’s most dignified square fans gloriously onto the River Tagus and now houses Lisbon’s main tourist office and one of the city’s gastronomic highlights.

Praça do Comércio was Pombal’s attempt to stage a coup in architectural symbolism, the culmination of an enlightened despot’s vision for a model city. The square’s showpiece is the bronze equestrian statue of the king Dom José I. Cast in 1774, it was the work of renowned sculptor Machado de Castro. The statue is flanked by classic 18th-century three-storey pastel-yellow buildings, designed by Eugénio dos Santos, now occupied by administrative offices. On the north side of the square, nestling beneath the arcaded colonnades, is one of Lisbon’s most famous literary landmarks, Café Martinho do Arcado, which first opened in 1782. Fernando Pessoa, its most celebrated patron, is claimed to have penned Mensagem at one of the original wooden tables. Two of Portugal’s other literary legends, Almeida Garret and Eça de Queirós also came here to muse during the belle époque before heading to the Avenida da Liberdade for a customary stroll on Lisbon’s chi chi boulevard. Around the corner, on Praça do Muncipio, the Câmara Municipal (City Hall), built in 1974 and attibuted to Eugénio dos Santos, was considered by Fernando Pessoa to be Lisbon’s most beautiful building. The façade was erected after the earthquake.

The Igreja de São Domingos stands on the site of the Convento de São Domingos where, between the 16th and 19th century, the sentences of the Inquisition were gruesomely carried out. Originally founded in 1242 by Don Sancho II, it was virtually destroyed by the earthquake in 1755. Today, all that remains of the original construction are the vestry and the high altar, which had been restored in 1748 by Ludovice of Mafra fame. The church was rebuilt by Manuel Caetano de Sousa, who reconstructed the portal using the royal chapel and balcony that had been salvaged from the Paço da Ribeira. This is one of the Baixa’s most combustible corners, the social hub of the African community, and where crinkled men clutching Duralex glasses of sticky cherry liqueur spill out onto the square from closet-sized ginginha bars.

To the northwest runs the pedestrianized Rua das Portas de Santo Antão, famous for its fish and seafood restaurants where waiters brandish multi-lingual menus, gigantic lobsters peer through the windows of 1950s restaurants and coffee shops provide late-night sustenance. During the Middle Ages, this district was famous for its debauchery. By the 15th century, Rua Jardim do Regedor was known as Rua da Mancebia (Concubinage Street). In the 19th century, it became the Lisbon’s racey cabaret district, its Moulin Rouge, echoed in the imposing Coliseu dos Recreios. Designed by Goulard in 1888, with a tall classical façade, topped by a metallic dome, it provides an incongruous grandeur to this narrow prosaic street of Pombaline severity. Originally built to house a circus, it is now a major concert venue. At number 58, the Casa de Alentejo, built in the 17th century, was the site of Maxim’s casino before it became a cultural centre for the Alentejo community in 1932. It’s worth dropping in for the fine regional dishes, as well as for its Moorish serenity.

From the Largo da Anunciada, the Elevador da Lavra, reaches up to the Torel district. Opened in 1884, it was the world’s first ever funicular and originally powered by water. The steep incline above leads up to Rua de São José where locals feast on balcalhão and Brazilian telenovelas in cheap tascas .

The ‘Restorer’s Square’ commemorates Portugal’s regaining of independence from Spain in 1640 with a soaring obelisk. Grabbing attention alongside the square is one of Lisbon’s architectural icons, the Eden Cinema, a voluptuous art deco marvel, built in 1929. Unfortunately, only the stunning staircase was ever classified, the rest of the building having been sacrilegiously converted into an aparthotel. (Its lavish interior masqueraded as a Russian hotel in the Wim Wender’s movie Until the End of the World.) Alongside, the lofty Palácio Foz, built in 1755, was the work of Francisco Xavier Fabri. It was bought by the Marquês de Foz in 1886 when it received the first of many facelifts. The ballroom features outstanding paintings by Columbano Bordalo Pinheiro (1857-1929). The palace, rather prosaically, now houses the second of Lisbon’s main tourist offices.

From behind the Hotel Eden, the Elevador da Glória defies one of Lisbon’s steepest gradients, chugging cartoon-style to the stunning Miradouro de São Pedro de Alcântara.

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