Five quick tips for a pleasant Florida Street shopping experience: • Don’t take up any offers for local currency exchange or strip shows. • Keep in mind that most of the panhandlers along Florida are professionals, it is preferable to donate to an official local charity or help someone you personally befriend. • Florida is […]
Money Exchange & Other Hustles on Florida St.
On Florida Street, downtown Buenos Aires’ pedestrian mall, near the corner of LaValle, it’s inevitable to come across some shady-looking characters yelling out, ‘cambio, cambio!’ These ‘unofficial’ (read: illegal) money changers, are known in Lunfardo as arbolitos. A new administration regularized the currency situation in late 2015, these money changers offered dollar and euro exchange […]
Porteño Corner: Artist & Street Vendor, Sebastión Castro
Sebastión Castro Artisan/street vendor Age: 29 Martínez (northern suburbs) Q: How long have you been in Buenos Aires and how did you end up here? I’m from Rio Negro—El Bolson. I came to Buenos Aires four years ago after I met my girlfriend when she was visiting […]
Edificio Bencich and the South End of Florida St.
← cont. from: Diagonal Norte—La Equitativa del Plata Building Another architectural gem on the heavily photographed corner of Diagonal Norte at Florida Street is Edificio Bencich at Roque Sáenz Peña Avenue 615. It was designed by French architect, Eduardo Le Monnie and completed by the Bencich Brothers firm in 1927. This building, with its traditional […]
Florida St.— The Bank of Boston Building
← cont. from: Florida Street at Diagonal Norte Facing Plazoleta Ciriaco Ortiz is the emblematic Bank of Boston Building, now Standard Bank, a 1924 neocolonial structure with a gothic touch. It’s noted for its huge 17-meter arched Plateresque-style doorway, meticulously carved from limestone. The architects of the Bank of Boston were two notable Argentine immigrants, […]