Edificio Oberpaur, Modern commercial building in downtown Santiago, Chile.
Edificio Oberpaur rises at the corner of Huérfanos and Estado streets, built in 1929 by Sergio Larraín García-Moreno and Jorge Arteaga for the German merchant Oberpaur. Its facade curves around the corner, and the design follows Erich Mendelsohn's 1928 Schocken department store: free floor plans, continuous horizontal spaces and no ornament at all.
Architects Sergio Larraín García-Moreno and Jorge Arteaga completed this structure in 1929 as Chile's first modernist building. The completion marked a turning point in how commercial and office spaces were designed throughout the country.
The corner is known as "la esquina Goyescas", after the El Goyescas shop that occupied the ground floor and became a Santiago meeting point. Oreste Plath records that Chile's first escalator was installed there, drawing children to ride it. The shop closed on 31 March 1963; a Salcobrand pharmacy now occupies the corner space.
The building stands at the corner of Huérfanos and Estado streets, in the historic centre of Santiago. The Salcobrand pharmacy now occupies the ground-floor corner space, so the curved facade is best seen from the opposite pavement. The upper floors hold offices and a conference room and are not open to visitors.
The first escalator in Chile was installed in the Oberpaur store on the ground floor, and Oreste Plath recalls it drew crowds of children. The shop later became El Goyescas, whose fame fixed the corner in local memory as "la esquina Goyescas".
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