If there is a queen of the collective imagination of Argentine happiness, it is indisputably Mar del Plata. Located in the Province of Buenos Aires, about 400 kilometers from the capital and accessible by train (an important fact in a country that dismantled its railway network in the nineties), it has been the preferred vacation spot for Argentines for over a century. Inspired by Gerardo Panero's documentary El Ariston, I want to summarize a bit of its history from an architectural perspective to highlight the uniqueness of this city.

Founded by Patricio Peralta Ramos (one of the most influential families in the country) on February 10, 1874, on what were once his properties, Mar del Plata was the summer retreat of Argentina's elite until approximately the 1930s. Inspired by French seaside towns, the Bristol promenade is a clear example of its Belle Époque era. The only remaining pieces of that first promenade are its street lamps, which have been restored and installed in Plaza Mitre. Another classic building from that time is the Torreón del Monje, built in 1904 to mimic a Gothic-style castle.

We also have the Ortiz Basualdo mansion from this period, now the Juan Carlos Castagnino Municipal Museum of Art. Built in 1909 and crowning the Stella Maris hill, it epitomizes the summer homes of the upper class, with a Norman picturesque style. Another example is the house of writer Victoria Ocampo’s family, now a cultural center donated to UNESCO. This 1912 house was purchased in Great Britain, shipped by boat, and assembled at its current location.

But by the end of the 1930s, things began to change. In 1938, the Bristol promenade was demolished, and the construction of the Hotel Provincial, the Casino, and the new promenade began. The project was awarded to Alejandro Bustillo, one of the country’s most prominent architects and, conveniently, also the brother of the Minister of Public Works for the Province of Buenos Aires (a saying of the time was “No brick [ladrillo] moves without Bustillo knowing”). The new promenade was adorned with two sculptures of sea lions made from Mar del Plata stone — a quartz-rich stone extracted from nearby quarries — by sculptor José Fioravanti. These sculptures remain the city's most recognizable postcard.

Not only did its appearance change, but middle-class tourists also began to arrive. By the late 1940s, with Perón's presidency, the working class conquered the city. To this day, Argentines say a crowded place “is like the Bristol in January,” referring to the busiest central beach that has no free space during summer. Thus, union hotels and chalets made of Mar del Plata stone proliferated; every middle-class family’s dream was to own a summer home.

Two architectural milestones from this period stand out. Between 1943 and 1945, the architect couple Amancio Williams and Delfina Gálvez Bunge designed the Casa sobre el Arroyo [House Over the Stream] for Amancio’s father, renowned musician and composer Alberto Williams. The house, a bridge over the Las Chacras stream, is made of reinforced concrete, embodying modernism and echoing the long, narrow chorizo-style houses. The house suffered years of abandonment and a fire, but its restoration has just concluded, and it is open to the public.

The second example, however, is less fortunate: the Ariston parador [a beach bar]. In the late 1940s, Mar del Plata's success led to plans to expand vacation homes southward, on lands that once belonged to the Martínez de Hoz family. For this purpose, a parador was commissioned to serve as a bar and sales point for these plots. The project was initially assigned to architects Carlos Coira and Eduardo Catalano. However, Marcel Breuer, a Bauhaus legend, was visiting to give lectures at the University of Buenos Aires. Upon hearing about the project, Breuer quickly sketched a four-leaf clover-shaped structure on a napkin and partnered with them. The Ariston was built in just two months in 1948, operating until the 1960s when the land project failed. It changed ownership multiple times and housed various unsuccessful businesses. Today, despite its architectural significance and Breuer's name, the building is abandoned and at risk of collapse.

In 1943, the Hotel Hermitage opened, the city's most classic hotel, designed by Julio Barros and facing Bustillo's complex. The hotel’s entrance features a Hollywood-style Walk of Fame, where artists visiting the city since 1985 leave their handprints and signatures in cement. You can find local celebrities like Charly García and Sandro, as well as international stars like Willem Dafoe, Gérard Depardieu, Juliette Binoche, and Susan Sarandon. Since 1954, Mar del Plata has hosted Argentina's most important international film festival, the only Latin American festival with an A-category designation.

This brief tour demonstrates that Mar del Plata is one of Argentina's most dynamic cities. In just over a century, it has changed its appearance several times. In the 1950s, it boasted the highest construction rate in the world. From the 1960s onward, high-rise buildings with small apartments proliferated, fulfilling the dream of owning a summer property, where size doesn’t matter, as the priority is to spend as much time as possible on the beach.

Today, the hotel offerings are outdated, aesthetically stuck in the 1980s films of comedy duo Olmedo and Porcel. But owners of those studio apartments purchased in the seventies and eighties are updating them to match the Airbnb aesthetic and rent them out in dollars (another great Argentine passion). The city is also experiencing a culinary boom. Mar del Plata is the birthplace of sorrentinos, one of Argentina’s favorite pasta dishes. Their creators, the owners of Trattoria Vespoli, still operate the restaurant, where wait times are long without a reservation. I suggest reading Virginia Higa's novel to learn the hilarious story of this Italian-named dish that doesn’t exist outside Argentina.

Some visit Mar del Plata with nostalgia, some criticize it for being “tacky,” while others dream of dropping everything to live in La Feliz [The Happy City]. But in my view, even its detractors secretly love it. As the popular 1960s song by Juan y Juan goes:

Que lindo es estar en Mar del Plata
En alpargatas, en alpargatas
Felices y bailando en una pata
En Mar del Plata soy feliz

[How nice it is to be in Mar del Plata,
in espadrilles, in espadrilles,
happy and dancing on one foot,
in Mar del Plata, I am happy.]