Top 28 Mexico City Attractions

Mex­i­co City is the old­est cap­i­tal of the Amer­i­c­as, which arose on the ruins of an Aztec city. This left its mark on the appear­ance of the metrop­o­lis.

What to do in Mexico City

The his­tor­i­cal cen­ter of the city attracts tourists with numer­ous palaces and tem­ples. Its archi­tec­tur­al splen­dor will be appre­ci­at­ed by aes­thetes.

Muse­ums of the city care­ful­ly store arti­facts of long-gone civ­i­liza­tions. Vis­it­ing their exhi­bi­tions will be inter­est­ing for lovers of secrets, mys­ter­ies and every­thing unknown.

The sights of Mex­i­co City are not lim­it­ed to mate­r­i­al her­itage. Streets, squares and mar­kets are the guardians of a spe­cial atmos­phere that every­one should feel.

Architecture

Chapultepec Palace

The palace stands on a hill of the same name with a height of 2325 m. Pre­vi­ous­ly, Mex­i­can rulers used it as an offi­cial res­i­dence, then a mil­i­tary acad­e­my lodged here and even an obser­va­to­ry worked. Today it hous­es the Nation­al His­tor­i­cal Muse­um.

The build­ing with columns, arch­es and balustrades began to be erect­ed in the 18th cen­tu­ry by order of King Bernar­do de Galvez. Soon the fund­ing ran out and the project had to be put on hold. Con­struc­tion con­tin­ued only in 1806 after the pur­chase of the build­ing by Emper­or Max­i­m­il­ian of Hab­s­burg. He made exten­sive rede­vel­op­ment and turned the neo­clas­si­cal palace into his coun­try res­i­dence.

National Palace

The baroque build­ing adorns the Zoca­lo square. Here is the archive, the trea­sury, muse­ums and the res­i­dence of the Pres­i­dent.

The palace was built in 1693 by order of Cortes. To speed up its con­struc­tion, work­ers used stones from Mon­tezu­ma’s palace. It turned out a grandiose 200-meter struc­ture. Ini­tial­ly, it had only two floors, in the 1930s anoth­er lev­el was added.

The main dec­o­ra­tion of the inte­ri­or is the fres­coes by the out­stand­ing artist Diego Riv­iera. On them, the mas­ter depict­ed epic episodes from the his­to­ry of Mex­i­co.

Palace of Cortes

The mas­sive build­ing appeared in the 15th cen­tu­ry on the site of an Aztec tem­ple on the orders of Cortes. More like a fortress than a palace, it was designed to show the great­ness of Span­ish cul­ture and pro­tect the viceroy from attacks by dis­grun­tled natives.

The glob­al recon­struc­tion of the struc­ture took place in the mid-1970s. Today it hous­es a muse­um ded­i­cat­ed to the evo­lu­tion of the region. In 19 rooms exhib­it­ed items relat­ed to the Aztec era, impor­tant doc­u­ments, maps and paint­ings.

latin american tower

The sky­scraper with a height of 183 m (45 floors) is locat­ed in the very cen­ter of the cap­i­tal. It was built in the mid 1950s. Locat­ed in a seis­mi­cal­ly haz­ardous area, the giant suc­cess­ful­ly with­stood sev­er­al major earth­quakes. Almost the entire build­ing is occu­pied by offices of var­i­ous com­pa­nies, and obser­va­tion decks are equipped on the 43rd and 45th floors.

Palace of Fine Arts

The Car­rara mar­ble opera build­ing was built in the his­toric cen­ter of Mex­i­co City in the 30s. The Palace of Fine Arts, designed by the Ital­ian archi­tect Adamo Boari, is the mate­r­i­al embod­i­ment of sev­er­al styles at once — neo­clas­si­cal, art nou­veau and bezart.

Its inner walls are rich­ly fres­coed by the great Mex­i­can artists Siqueiros, Mariscal and Rivera. Peo­ple come here not only to lis­ten to opera and watch bal­let, but also to vis­it two muse­ums — an archi­tec­tur­al muse­um and a muse­um ded­i­cat­ed to the Palace itself.

postal palace

The main post office or the Postal Palace was built at the begin­ning of the 20th cen­tu­ry by order of Pres­i­dent Por­firio Diaz. He was not very pop­u­lar with the peo­ple, but it was dur­ing his reign that many beau­ti­ful build­ings and streets appeared in the Mex­i­can cap­i­tal.

The eclec­tic facade of the palace is dec­o­rat­ed with arched win­dows, bal­conies, carved por­ti­cos and a huge clock. The inte­ri­or is pompous. The dec­o­ra­tion is dom­i­nat­ed by glass, gild­ing, mar­ble and stuc­co. The palace was seri­ous­ly dam­aged dur­ing the 1985 earth­quake, restora­tion work was car­ried out only 10 years lat­er.

Iturbide

The lux­u­ri­ous 3‑storey baroque palace was the wed­ding gift of the Count of Val­paraiso to his daugh­ter. The con­struc­tion was super­vised by the archi­tect Fran­cis­co Anto­nio Guer­rero y Tor­res. He dec­o­rat­ed the facade with ele­gant stone carv­ings and balustrades, installed tow­ers on the sides, placed a bal­cony and a grandiose arch over the entrance.

In the XIX cen­tu­ry, the Col­lege of Min­ing was locat­ed in the palace, then a hotel. In 1965, the munic­i­pal­i­ty bought the build­ing, and after restora­tion, cre­ative work­shops set­tled in it. Today it is a pop­u­lar venue for exhi­bi­tions.

Churches and cathedrals

Cathedral

The largest Catholic cathe­dral in Latin Amer­i­ca was erect­ed in 1532 on the site of an Aztec tem­ple glo­ri­fy­ing Huitzilopochtli, the god of war. The stones of the destroyed sanc­tu­ary were part­ly used as build­ing mate­r­i­al.

The archi­tec­ture of the build­ing shows fea­tures of Goth­ic, Baroque and Renais­sance. The nave ris­es to a height of 110 m, on the sides there are two quad­ran­gu­lar tow­ers, on which a total of 30 bells are placed. In the mid­dle stands a small­er tow­er with chimes. The exte­ri­or is com­ple­ment­ed by sculp­tures of saints and apos­tles.

The inte­ri­or impress­es with the abun­dance of gold details on the mar­ble columns, vaults and walls. In 1962, the cathe­dral had to be recon­struct­ed after a seri­ous fire.

Church of the Blessed Virgin Pilar

Also known as La Ense­naza, this church is con­sid­ered one of the most beau­ti­ful in the cap­i­tal. Ini­tial­ly, its build­ing housed a monastery found­ed by Maria Igna­sia Alzor. After the mil­i­tary reform in 1867, the monastery was closed, and it was emp­ty for more than a hun­dred years. Then the build­ing was trans­ferred to the juris­dic­tion of the church.

The archi­tec­ture of the build­ing is a reflec­tion of the unique Mex­i­can Chur­rigueresque style. The facade is notable for numer­ous open­work details carved in stone. The main point of attrac­tion is a giant altar that reach­es the lev­el of the roof. It is rich­ly dec­o­rat­ed with gold and fig­ures of saints.

The intri­cate wood­work of the inte­ri­or looks art­ful. And the fres­coes on the walls depict scenes from the life of Pilar.

Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe

The con­struc­tion of this tem­ple is asso­ci­at­ed with a leg­end. One day, a peas­ant named Juan Diego was going to morn­ing mass in the neigh­bor­ing town of Tlatelol­co, when sud­den­ly on the Tepey­ac hill he saw a beau­ti­ful woman, from under whose feet light streamed. It was the Vir­gin Mary. She ordered to go to the bish­op and tell him to build a church on the hill.

The bish­op did not believe and demand­ed proof. When the Moth­er of God appeared again, Castil­ian ros­es blos­somed on the hill — an unprece­dent­ed phe­nom­e­non for win­ter. The peas­ant wrapped them in a cloak and brought them to the bish­op. As soon as he took out the flow­ers, the cape shone, and the face of the Vir­gin appeared on it.

The Basil­i­ca of Our Lady of Guadalupe was built in 1531, and almost imme­di­ate­ly it became a place of pil­grim­age for Chris­tians. Despite the fact that the tem­ple was repeat­ed­ly rebuilt, its main rel­ic — a peas­an­t’s cloak with the face of the Vir­gin Mary — has been pre­served.

Museums

National Anthropological Museum

The largest muse­um in Mex­i­co keeps the rich­est col­lec­tion of objects from the pre-Columbian era. These are objects of every­day life and wor­ship of the Mayan, Olmec and Aztec peo­ples, found dur­ing exca­va­tions in Mex­i­co.

The muse­um oper­ates on the ter­ri­to­ry of Cha­pul­te­pec Park. On an area of ​​about 8 hectares, there are sev­er­al open-air exhi­bi­tion areas and 23 pavil­ions. The high­light of the col­lec­tion is the stat­ue of the God of Rain and the “stone of the sun”. The Mayan cal­en­dar made a lot of noise among the fatal­ists who expect­ed the end of the world in 2012.

Frida Kahlo Museum

A tal­ent­ed artist, com­mu­nist, devot­ed wife and hos­pitable host­ess has become a sym­bol of Mex­i­co. The house where Fri­da Kahlo and her hus­band Diego Rivero lived was turned into a muse­um by local author­i­ties in 1955.

The house tells about the dai­ly life of a bril­liant fam­i­ly. Frida’s per­son­al belong­ings are on dis­play here: clothes, jew­el­ry, brush­es, as well as paints and an easel donat­ed by banker David Rock­e­feller. The inte­ri­or has been pre­served unchanged — it breathes with love and hos­pi­tal­i­ty, which the Trot­sky cou­ple used in the ear­ly 1930s.

The muse­um exhibits the most sig­nif­i­cant mas­ter­pieces of the artist, among them “Marx­ism will give health to the sick”, “Fri­da and the cae­sare­an sec­tion” and “Long Live Life”.

Diego Rivera Mural Museum

This muse­um was cre­at­ed to pre­serve one sin­gle piece of art — a fres­co by Diego Rivero, which he cre­at­ed for the Pra­do Hotel in 1975. The hotel build­ing was to be demol­ished after a dev­as­tat­ing earth­quake. A frag­ment of the wall was sim­ply care­ful­ly cut out and moved to a new loca­tion.

The mur­al “Sun­day Dream in Alame­da Park”, 15 m in size and 4 m wide, is an epic work that depicts icon­ic fig­ures that influ­enced the his­to­ry and devel­op­ment of Mex­i­co at dif­fer­ent times: Max­i­m­il­ian Hab­s­burg, José Mar­ti, Ben­i­to Juarez and oth­ers. Diego Rivero por­trayed him­self as a boy held by the hand of Christi­na Posa­da. The gaze of the child is fixed on his wife, Fri­da Kahlo.

Templo Mayor

Tem­p­lo May­or, whose name trans­lates from Span­ish as “big tem­ple” is a unique open-air muse­um. The com­plex is the ruins of the Aztec reli­gious build­ings. The main ones are the tem­ples of the gods Tlaloc and Huitzilopochtli, locat­ed on a 60-meter pyra­mid.

Heat May­or was built around 1325, and two cen­turies lat­er it was destroyed by the con­quis­ta­dors. The remains of the pyra­mid were acci­den­tal­ly dis­cov­ered in the 20th cen­tu­ry dur­ing the lay­ing of a cable.

Soumaya Museum

The futur­is­tic build­ing imme­di­ate­ly attracts atten­tion: the 46-meter facade looks like an anvil cov­ered with sparkling scales. The muse­um has 6 floors — it can take sev­er­al days to view the expo­si­tions. Inside is a col­lec­tion of art worth over $700 mil­lion.

The muse­um was opened in 1994 by the rich­est res­i­dent of Mex­i­co, Car­los Slim, and named after his late wife, Zumaya. More than 60 thou­sand items of Euro­pean art of the 15th-20th cen­turies are stored in the store­rooms.

The paint­ings of Dali, Da Vin­ci, Picas­so, Cha­gall, Renoir deserve spe­cial atten­tion. Here you can also admire the col­lec­tion of sculp­tures by Rodin — the sec­ond largest in the world (360 pieces in total).

The Wax Museum

The muse­um opened in 1979 and since then has been reg­u­lar­ly updat­ed with new exhibits. Today, it exhibits 160 wax copies of promi­nent peo­ple in the world of pol­i­tics, art, sports, as well as heroes of cult films.

The fig­ures are placed in 14 halls by epoch, field of activ­i­ty or sub­ject. Here you can take a pho­to with Michael Jack­son, Mar­garet Thatch­er or Arnold Schwarzeneg­ger as the Ter­mi­na­tor. There is a sou­venir shop at the exit.

National History Museum

The muse­um, estab­lished in 1944, is locat­ed in Cha­pul­te­pec Cas­tle. Exhi­bi­tions occu­py two floors, exhibits are locat­ed in 20 halls. In total, more than 150 thou­sand items are stored in the store­rooms. All of them are asso­ci­at­ed with dif­fer­ent time peri­ods in Mex­i­co.

The stands fea­ture coins, clothes, antique fur­ni­ture, house­hold items, engrav­ings, pho­tographs, paint­ings, and sculp­tures. On the top floor there is a dio­ra­ma recre­at­ing the inte­ri­or of the cas­tle dur­ing the reign of King Max­i­m­il­ian I.

Folk Art Museum

Cre­at­ed in 2006, the muse­um aims to pro­mote Mex­i­can folk art, which is a mix­ture of Amerindi­an and Span­ish tra­di­tions. There are items made of glass, met­al, wood and ceram­ics. Paint­ings and sculp­tures are col­lect­ed in sep­a­rate rooms. Masks and jew­el­ry deserve spe­cial atten­tion.

The muse­um has a school where you can sign up for a mas­ter class and mas­ter your favorite craft.

Interesting places

Paseo de la Reforma

The main avenue of the cap­i­tal cross­es Mex­i­co City in a straight diag­o­nal. The project was devel­oped by Fer­di­nand von Rosen­zweig back in 1860. He took the famous streets and avenues of major Euro­pean cities as a basis. The grandiose con­struc­tion was ini­ti­at­ed by the monarch Max­i­m­il­ian I, who wished to con­nect Cha­pul­te­pec and the impe­r­i­al palace with a direct road.

The length of the avenue is approx­i­mate­ly 12 km. It hous­es cafes, restau­rants, bars, bou­tiques and office build­ings. The main attrac­tion is the mon­u­ment “Angel of Inde­pen­dence”. The col­umn was erect­ed in hon­or of the vic­to­ry in the strug­gle for inde­pen­dence.

Mercado de Artesania

Col­or­ful, bustling and amaz­ing, Mer­ca­do de Arteza­nia is the best place to buy sou­venirs and expe­ri­ence Mex­i­can cul­ture. All prod­ucts here are made by local crafts­men. Som­breros, ceram­ics, jew­el­ry and cloth­ing in the nation­al style are espe­cial­ly pop­u­lar with tourists. Be sure to bar­gain before buy­ing.

Constitution Square

Zoca­lo Square (anoth­er name for the Con­sti­tu­tion) is the sym­bol of Mex­i­co City. It is the largest in Latin Amer­i­ca and one of the largest in the world. In the mid­dle stands a flag­pole with a wav­ing ban­ner.

The area is framed by admin­is­tra­tive build­ings, the Cathe­dral and the Pres­i­den­tial Palace. Paving stones are stones from the tem­ples and palaces of the ruined Indi­an city of Tenochti­t­lan.

Sonora

Also known as the Witch’s Mar­ket, Sono­ra is a labyrinth of streets and alleys lined with stalls of mag­i­cal para­pher­na­lia. Despite the fact that Mex­i­cans are ardent Catholics, they do not hes­i­tate to resort to the help of oth­er­world­ly forces to solve every­day prob­lems.

Here you can buy charms from the evil eye, tal­is­mans for good luck, soap guar­an­teed to attract the atten­tion of the oppo­site sex, drugs for all dis­eases. There is no prob­lem that can­not be solved with the Sono­ra Mar­ket range.

art garden

An art gar­den has been oper­at­ing in Sul­li­van Park since the 1950s. Here, every Sun­day, paint­ings, pho­tographs, prints, sculp­tures, instal­la­tions by local artists are exhib­it­ed and sold. The largest part of the orig­i­nal open-air shop is occu­pied by paint­ing. The sub­ject, the size of the can­vas, as well as the choice of artis­tic means for express­ing fan­ta­sy are not lim­it­ed by any­thing.