ANDl Santa Cruz de Tenerife City Council will allocate some 3.2 million euros to the rehabilitation of the Masonic Temple, whose works will begin during the first quarter of 2022, with an execution period of between 12 and 15 months.
The mayor of Santa Cruz, José Manuel Bermúdez, accompanied by the Councilor for Works and Infrastructure, Dámaso Arteaga, and the architect of the action, María Nieves Febles, presented the project for the remodeling of the Masonic Temple.
The mayor stressed that it is the “only sample of Masonic architecture in Spain, built in 1904, and that it is called to become a building that, once renovated, will be a first-order claim for residents and visitors and a pole of indisputable attraction for the European and international Masonic community ”.
José Manuel Bermúdez valued “a rehabilitation of the historical heritage of this municipality that reaffirms the political commitment of the government group to recover for this capital all the symbols and buildings with which it is intended that the neighbors feel proud of this city, its history and its culture ”.
“Also for those who visit us, to whom we must convey that this city has a lot to see and tell, such as the next Rodin museum in Viera and Clavijo, the collection of street sculptures, the Palacio de Carta, the building Villasegura or the Castillo de San Andrés, among others ”, he added.
In the presentation, Jesús Soriano Carrillo, the Very Powerful Sovereign Grand Commander of the Supreme Council of the 33rd and Last Degree of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite for Spain, also took the floor, and representatives of various lodges were also present in the Plenary Hall, members of the Tertulia Cultural 25 de Julio, College of Architects of Santa Cruz de Tenerife and members of the project’s drafting team, among other personalities.
PROJECT APPROVAL.
For his part, Dámaso Arteaga added that the roadmap that the City Council has regarding the Masonic Temple begins with the final approval of the project, which has had a cost of 230,000 euros, and the tender for the execution of the works, estimated at about 3.2 million euros. He added that these times begin during the first quarter of the year 2022, with an execution period of between 12 and 15 months, so we trust that in 2023 it will be a reality “.
The projected works will consist of the symbolic and material recovery of the Masonic lodge, taking into account its BIC category, in addition to adapting and making the new uses compatible with the patrimonial nature of the building, also contemplating the recovery of the spatial and iconographic configuration of the spaces with the greatest symbolism, such as the Sala de Tenidas and the Sala de Ágapes.
For this purpose, the writing team contemplates “incorporating current construction techniques, in newly created spaces or spaces of symbolic interest, whose resolution is more advantageous for the final resolution”, which is why it is added that “the spaces will be resolved allowing the use public of the building, according to the regulations in force, accessibility (elevator), fire regulations, structural adaptation to new or future uses and incorporating the necessary facilities, without distorting the original image, or being aggressive in terms of its expression, leaving the as camouflaged as possible ”, says the architect.
From the point of view of history that the building was erected by the Añaza Lodge, which became the most important Canarian Masonic workshop of the 20th century, both because of its long history and because it decisively contributed to organizing and consolidating Freemasonry in the Canary Islands, but also to disseminate the culture and ideas of progress in the society of Tenerife and the Canary Islands of the time.
Founded in 1895, throughout its existence it was under the auspices of different ‘Orientes’: with number 125, under the auspices of the Great Iberian East (1895-1903); of the renewed Great Spanish East with nº 270 (1903-1922), changing the ritualistic in all its degrees to practice the Scottish rite, Ancient and Accepted; from the Grand Lodge of the Canary Islands (1922-1931) with number 1, and finally, to the Great Symbolic Federal Council of the Great Spanish East again with number 270 (1931-1936).
The manifestations of Masonic architecture are basically limited to the funerary sphere and the construction of temples or seats for the lodges. In this sense, the Masonic Temple of Santa Cruz de Tenerife is not only the only building designed and erected as a Masonic temple that has survived the Franco dictatorship, but also one of the most important examples of Spanish civil architecture erected in 1904.
