Construction of the Peruvian Government Palace ("Palacio de Gobierno" in Spanish) started in 1926, during the presidency of Augusto B. Leguía . The first phase was designed by the French architect Claudio Sahut . The second phase was built between 1937 and 1938, during the presidency of Oscar R. Benavides.

When the Spanish conquerors came to Peru, they founded several cities. In 1534, Hernando Pizarro , in the Pachacamac sanctuary, sent an expedition to look for a strategic place for the city that would later become the capital of the vice-kingdom. The expeditionary team came to the valley of Lima and found an established culture, where the administrative center was built around a main plaza. Since the place was near the ocean and in a fertile valley, Francisco Pizarro thought convenient of founding there the "City of the Kings". The ceremony of foundation took place where the Main Plaza currently lies, on January 18, 1535. Immediately, parcels of land were given out to the attending conquerors and some neighbours of Jauja and San Gallán, according to the maps and plans created by Diego de Agüero . The space to be given out was distributed into 117 blocks, and each block had 4 parcels.

The house of Governor Francisco Pizarro was built in a simple manner, with a patio in the middle and a garden in which a ficus tree was planted (still exists today).

At the beginning of the republican life, the old house of the Vice-kings was named the "House of the Government of the Republic of Peru". In it, several ministries functioned.

In 1926, the then President Augusto B. Leguía gave the task of the design of the new Government Palace to the French architect Jean Claude Antoine Sahut Laurent. In 1932, work on the palace stopped.

Later, the then President Oscar R. Benavides assigned the completion of the contruction to the architect Ricardo de Jaxa Malachowski. Work started on August 4, 1937 with the demolition of the oldest structure. The project was completed the following year, when the new Government Palace was officially inaugurated.

External link

Several pictures of the Palace