History of Munoa Estate and Palace
The Munoa Estate is a bourgeois manor located in Barakaldo, reformed in the French style by architect Ricardo Bastida.
A bit of history
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Munoa’s location is mentioned in the 16th century as one of the properties of the nearby Monastery of Burceña, where there is said to have contained a caserío farmhouse, apple orchards, vineyards and gardens until the mid-19th century. All of this land was purchased around 1860 by Juan Echevarria La Llana, the mayor of Bilbao, who had been on the council several times and was one of the biggest landowners in Barakaldo. He ordered an elegant country estate to be built there.
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In 1916, the house was passed down to Rafael Echevarria Azcarate, the grandson of Juan and his wife Amalia Echevarrieta, the sister of famous industrialist Horacio Echevarrieta. The couple decided to completely remodel the mansion and commissioned architect Ricardo de Bastida for the job, who preserved the original frame, adding a tower to each side and transforming the building into a mansion in the style of the Second French Empire. In turn, they decided to build a garage, a guard post, a caserío farmhouse and a large English-style garden.
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Horacio Echevarrieta Maruri and his sister Amalia were the children of Cosme Echevarrieta Lascurain, a Republican party leader and businessman with a wide variety of properties and holdings in the mining industry. Horacio inherited his father's properties and political positions and, through the company Echevarrieta-Larrinaga, developed a commerce centre making him one of the most important businessmen of the first half of the 20th century. His most important business ventures were the Shipyards de Cádiz, Saltos del Duero, Iberia-Líneas Aéreas de España, line 1 of the Barcelona metro, Gran Vía in Madrid, the Press House, as well as several buildings built during the expansion of Bilbao.
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After becoming a wealthy man, he built many buildings including the Punta Begoña colonnade in Getxo. His star, however, began to fade when he was 40 years old, as a result of the debts he accumulated in his most ambitious project, the construction of a modern submarine model in the Shipyards of Cádiz. Partially bankrupt, he retired to live with his sister Amalia at the Munoa Palace, where he died in 1963.
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The land was held by the Echevarrieta family until 2014, when it was purchased by the Barakaldo city council.