Today, one goes to Quiapo, “sa ilalim ng tulay” under the bridge, to avail of beautiful Filipino handicrafts at sometimes reasonable, sometimes still touristy, prices. One goes to the Chinese wholesalers of foodstuffs and kitchen equipment along Carlos Palanca Sr. Street [ formerly Calle Echague ]. When one is desperate and penurious, one goes to the Quiapo Church, to pray before the miraculous image of the Black Nazarene, to Him who is the most burdened of the burdened [ when one is desperate and rich, one goes to the Santuario de San Antonio in Forbes Park, to the Chapel of the Asian Institute of Management, and to any Chapel of the "Opus Dei" ].
Contemporary, bustling Quiapo still resonates with the names of the old Filipino families who continue to own commercial properties in the area. Despite congestion and disorganization, it is still the seat of several, highly-lucrative, family-owned real estate empires worth Php billions. One is actually surprised to see a veritable registry of old, prominent families — Paterno, Araneta-Zaragoza, Padilla-Bibby, de los Reyes, Ongsiako, Villonco, Cu-Unjieng, Escaler — alongside the New Chinese Rich owning much of the commercial real estate of the Quiapo District.
But Old Quiapo, specially that aristocratic stretch of Calle San Sebastian [ later Calle R. Hidalgo ] from the 1850s until the PreWar, was actually an elegant place…
In the Quiapo of the olden times, it was actually a convenience and even a pleasure to have a house beside an “estero,” for these then-pristine streams supplied water for the gardens as well as an efficient route of transportation.
Like an Empress Dowager, the Paterno mansion — one of the most classically beautiful of the old Manila mansions — reigned over Calle San Sebastian from the 1850s onwards. The immense Paterno fortune was founded by a series of industrious and fortunate Chinese forebears. It spawned a life of high learning, luxury, and leisure for the younger members of the family. The palatial Paterno residences were noted for their European-style opulence, filled as they were with splendid furniture and exquisite decorations. By the late 1800s, the Paterno siblings were among the most cultured and refined of Manilenos as personified by the “ilustrado” Don Pedro Alejandro Paterno and his artistic sisters Dona Paz and Dona Adelaida. A suitably grand continuation of the fabled Paterno fortune survives to this day through the family of Dona Susana Paterno de Madrigal [ Mrs. Vicente Lopez Madrigal ], a descendant from a collateral branch [ Lucio Paterno ] who doubtless possessed the same incisive business acumen of her industrious pure Chinese and mestizo forebears.
The affluent Tuason-Legarda-Prieto-Valdes Clan had various grand residences along Calle San Sebastian and the nearby streets. When the famous arts and antiques collector Marie Theresa “Bebe” Lammoglia-Virata [ Mrs. Leonides Virata ] first saw the grand “Sala” of the “Museo De La Salle” in 2001, She remembered that it was as big — albeit with a higher ceiling — as the “Sala” of an old Prieto-Valdes residence of friends of hers along Calle R. Hidalgo that she had frequented as a young lady during the PreWar.
The Zamora Family of Quiapo also had several grand residences along the same street.
The celebrated, Neoclassical, Don Felix Roxas y Arroyo-designed mansion of the altruistic aesthete Don Rafael Enriquez was also located along Calle San Sebastian, a few houses to the left of the Paterno mansion.
On the same street was the very elegant mansion of Don Ramon Genato, renowned in its time from the 1880s-90s as a gathering place of “alta sociedad de Manila.” [ Don Ramon Genato also owned an older mansion along nearby Calle Evangelista. ] The raconteur Don Felix Roxas y Fernandez waxed nostalgic: “December 31 of every year, or the New Year’s Eve Ball, was traditionally held in the commodious and luxurious house of the Ramon Genatos whose children, out of love for their father, fondly took care of the lavish preparations for the festivity. By entering the portals of this unusual mansion on R. Hidalgo Street, the guests were brought face to face and impressed with the fine taste and artistic traits of the Genato children; and this impression was augmented when one passed through the artistically decorated and elegant rooms and halls of the mansion. The dining room appeared very splendid, not only because of the profusion of decorative plants and flowers and of fountains prepared with blocks of luminous ice, but also because of the regal appearance of the dining table decked with the latest in the decorative art.”
Near the bridge at # 1034 was the famous 1900s mansion of Don Gregorio Araneta y Soriano Dy Ching and Dona Carmen Zaragoza y Roxas [ now the site of the Quiapo Parochial School ]. Don Gregorio Araneta was an immensely successful lawyer whose first big case was the legal representation of the heirs of the tragic Don Francisco Roxas y Reyes who was executed for sedition in January of 1897. Dona Carmen Zaragoza was the daughter of the bon vivant publisher Don Jose Zaragoza y Aranquizna and Dona Rosa Roxas y Arce, an astute businesswoman who greatly expanded her inherited holdings. The very Filipina-looking Dona Rosa Roxas de Zaragoza* was a second cousin through the Roxas line of the aristocratic [ the de Ayala of Alava, Spain ] Spanish mestiza heiresses Dona Carmen Ayala de Roxas [ married to Don Pedro Pablo Roxas y de Castro ] and Dona Trinidad Ayala de Zobel [ married to Don Jacobo Zobel y Zangroniz ].
Also along Calle San Sebastian was the mansion of the Ilustre Family.
On Calle Barbosa [ now Bautista Street ] was the relatively modern, Vienna Secession-inspired mansion of Don Ariston Bautista y Lin and Dona Petrona Nakpil designed by the architect Arcadio Arellano in 1914. The writer Gilda Cordero-Fernando, who grew up in the area, recalled that the Nakpil ladies had very good taste and that they had exceptionally beautiful things.
At the corner of Calle San Sebastian and Calle Barbosa was a large but rather plain 1850s mansion which served as the Manila residence of a very rich Pampanguena who pioneered the acquisition of valuable Manila real estate among her provincial peers in the 1870s [ the large house was one of three she owned in the area ]. The firebrand Dona Matea Rodriguez de Sioco of Bacolor and Sulipan, Apalit buried two rich husbands [ Don Josef Sioco and Don Juan Arnedo Cruz ] and became the top financier of the revolutionary Katipunan in Pampanga in the late 1890s. She had two married daughters: Dona Sabina Sioco de Escaler and Dona Florencia Sioco de Gonzalez. When she died her large estate was divided into three equal parts between her two married daughters Dona Sabina and Dona Florencia along with her favorite grandson, Don Jose Escaler y Sioco. Dona Sabina Sioco de Escaler continued acquiring Manila commercial and residential real estate. She owned several large commercial properties in the Binondo, Santa Cruz, and Quiapo districts. By the 1910s, Dona Sabina owned several houses along Calle Arlegui and Calle General Solano in the fashionable San Miguel District aside from entire blocks in the Ermita and Malate districts.
In front of Plaza del Carmen, across San Sebastian Church, was the 1910s mansion of the Filipiniana ubercollector Don Felipe Hidalgo y Kleimpell. According to everyone who had visited it during Don Felipe’s lifetime, it was literally an “Ali Baba’s Cave” of treasures. For example, the “entresuelo” mezzanine of that house contained Filipino Old Master Felix Resurreccion Hidalgo’s exact replicas of his two prizewinning paintings in Madrid, Spain: “La Barca de Aqueronte” [ "The Boat of Charon" ] and “Virgenes Cristianas Expuestas al Populacho” [ "Christian maidens exposed to the populace" ]!!! Another masterpiece in that house was the portrait of “Don Narciso Padilla and his grandson Felix Resurreccion Hidalgo” by Filipino Old Master Antonio Malantic**.
Very near Plaza del Carmen were several residences belonging to the Spanish mestizo Zaragoza Family. The brothers Zaragoza y Aranquizna — among them Don Jose the publisher [ of the landmark "La Ilustracion Filipina" ] and Don Miguel the painter — were born in San Isidro, Nueva Ecija, the sons of a Spanish auditor of the Tobacco Monopoly. The widower Don Jose Zaragoza y Aranquizna was matched with the young, entrepreneurial, and affluent Senorita Rosa Roxas y Arce [ daughter of Don Mariano Leon Roxas y Arroyo and Dona Carmen Arce ] of Binondo. They built their house along Calle San Sebastian in Quiapo. Don Jose and Dona Rosa had six children: Dona Natividad [ married Don Demetrio Tuason ], Dona Carmen [ married Don Gregorio Araneta y Soriano Dy Ching ], Don Elias [ married Dona Rosario Velez y Rodriguez Ynfante ], Don Salvador [ married Dona Carolina Tuason y Gil de Sola ], Don Ramon [ married Dona Trinidad Matute; married Dona Juanita Marin ], and Dona Margarita [ married Don Carlos Preysler y Gonzales ]. Dona Rosa Roxas de Zaragoza built splendid houses for all her children. All in all, there were seven Zaragoza residences along Calle San Sebastian.
Approaching San Sebastian Church, to the right, was the fabled mansion of the “Conde de Aviles” the Count of Aviles which was later occupied by Don Benito Legarda. The “Conde de Aviles” was assigned by the Governor General to host King Norodom I of Cambodia during his visit to Manila and the outlying provinces in 1872 [ during those times Malacanang Palace was occasionally in disrepair and could not host visiting dignitaries in style ].
On a side street was the eccentric mansion of the Ocampo-de los Reyes Family, which was remodeled in the 1920s into a Japanese pagoda.
Inside Callejon Limanzana was an old house owned by Don Felipe Hidalgo which was occupied by the scholarly Don Alfonso Ongpin which was a veritable museum with an extensive Filipiniana, and Rizaliana, collection.
Expansive Calle Azcarraga [ now Claro M. Recto Avenue ] was lined with splendid mansions. One of them was the 1880s residence of Don Maximino Paterno. A few houses away was one of the inherited residences of Don Trinidad Hermenigildo Pardo de Tavera.
And of course, Old Quiapo was just a stone’s throw away from posh San Miguel District, which became the preferred address of The Rich after the Governor General’s Palace was moved from Intramuros to the Malacanang summer residence following the 1863 earthquake. During the 1880s, Calle General Solano teemed with the more sophisticated, European-inflected mansions — epitomized by the famous Eugster-Moreno Lacalle-Goldenberg — of the Spanish mestizo and Chinese mestizo elite beside the Pasig River.
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Notes:
*According to Regina Araneta-Teodoro, [ her great-grandmother ] Dona Rosa Roxas de Zaragoza was very Filipina-looking, as proven by an old photograph among the private papers of [ Dona Rosa's grandson ] Don Salvador Araneta y Zaragoza. Dona Rosa Roxas’ Spanish mestizo husband, Don Jose Zaragoza y Aranquizna, looked like Josef Stalin with his moustache.
**The portrait of “Don Narciso Padilla and his grandson Felix Resurreccion Hidalgo” was definitely painted by an Old Filipino Master: Antonio Malantic, Justiniano Asuncion, or Mariano Asuncion.
