Castillo Forestal, French restaurant and toy museum in Parque Forestal, Santiago, Chile
Castillo Forestal is a two-story building with large windows located in Parque Forestal in Santiago, offering views toward the Museum of Fine Arts. The ground floor holds a French restaurant that seats around 250 people, while the basement contains the toy museum.
The building was constructed in 1910 as a boathouse next to a navigable lagoon and kept original features like gargoyles and boat mooring rings. It later served as a water management office before becoming what it is today.
The basement contains a toy museum with objects from early 20th century Chile that reflect how children played and what daily life looked like. These pieces show the games and objects that families valued across several decades.
The restaurant section is open daily with spacious dining areas that receive plenty of natural light from the windows. Access to the toy museum in the basement involves stairs, so visitors with mobility concerns should plan accordingly.
The building still shows original boat mooring rings embedded in its walls from when it served as a boathouse, visible to those who look closely. These metal rings are a reminder that water once occupied the space beneath the park and the land had a completely different purpose.
The community of curious travelers
AroundUs brings together thousands of curated places, local tips, and hidden gems, enriched daily by 60,000 contributors worldwide.
