Osambela House, Colonial mansion in Lima, Peru.

Osambela House is a late colonial mansion completed between 1803 and 1805, with a light blue neoclassical facade on a grey stone base. Three dark wooden enclosed balconies project above the ground floor, whose windows carry black iron grilles and white pediments; a white balustrade runs along the roofline, and a small dome crowns an octagonal lookout on the left. Its rooms are laid out parallel to the street, giving the frontage room for five Louis XVI balconies.

The land belonged to the Basilica of Santo Domingo and held the Dominican novitiate, ruined by the 1746 earthquake; it was sold to the Spanish shipowner and banker Martín de Osambela, Marquis of Osambela. The house was completed between 1803 and 1805. In 1854 it passed to José de la Asunción Oquendo, hence the name Casa de Oquendo, and in 1941 to the Caja de Ahorros de Lima.

The house is known as the Casa de Oquendo, after José de la Asunción Oquendo, who bought it in 1854. Since 1979 it has housed the Inca Garcilaso de la Vega Cultural Center, and it now hosts the Lima Photography Biennial and the Peruvian academies of Language, Law, Medicine, History and Sciences.

The residence is readily accessible in central Lima and easy to locate within the historic district. Visitors should check in advance about interior access since the building functions as an educational institution with specific visiting conditions.

Unlike typical colonial mansions with rooms arranged deep into the interior, this property organizes its chambers parallel to the street frontage. This atypical layout produces an exceptionally broad and commanding facade that stands apart from standard residential designs of its era.