In the same way that Antoni Gaudí was the reference of Modernism or Reinaxança, in Barcelona at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, the greatest exponent of modernist architecture in Madrid, is occupied by the immeasurable figure and genius of a universal architect: Antonio Palacios.

Antonio Palacios -born in Porriño, on January 8, 1874 and died in El Plantío, on October 27, 1945- owes the city of Madrid a large part of this fantasy architecture, which located in the most central places and therefore, strategic of the city, it causes so much admiration among the tourists who continually visit us and they have such a predilection for taking selfies, choosing it as the best setting to have an unforgettable memory of a city that always looks to the future, but without ever forgetting its cultural heritage of the past.

To such an extent that a century later, in these crucial moments of a 21st century -which looks greedily at the colonization of the nearby universe, with the potential of new technologies- returns, in the case of our city, to look with nostalgia at its designs from the past, in an attempt to recover lost originality, in the same way, perhaps, that there was a time when earlier architectural styles began to be recovered, such as Gothic and Romanesque, a source from which numerous architects drank throughout his career.

Although his work is great, in the case of Antonio Palacios, it could be said that he was not only an architect of designs for wealthy minorities, as might be assumed at first glance, but also a designer who alternated his genius and knowledge towards elegant functionality. popular, to which he also infused his personal and futuristic touch, not without grandeur and originality.

Part of that originality, referring to the old designs of the popular Madrid Metro stations -and even of not a few service stations or gas stations- are currently being reviewed and recovered, a detail that reminds, obviously and comparatively speaking, ' the myth of the eternal return', referred to by the Romanian hermeneut, Mircea Eliade, applied to Architecture.

The most obvious example is the recent recovery of the Gran Vía Metro station, as well as the current projects to modify the popular Puerta del Sol, replacing the current design that gives access to the RENFE (National Railway Network) facilities. Spaniards) and known, due to its shape, as 'the whale', due to the old canopy design by Antonio Palacios.

Regardless of the fact that in the future we will be able to appreciate some of the most important buildings of this immeasurable architect, a note of genuine picturesqueness is still appreciated, observing, against the backdrop of part of his formidable architecture, the development of activities and careers popular, which once again refer the viewer to that eternal Madrid, where, as that great architect of Prose and Verse, Jorge Luis Borges, would say, Yesterday is Still and also Still.

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