Café del Príncipe, the Expansion of the Coliseo del Príncipe in Madrid: From Villanueva’s Drawings to Mariátegui’s Project

This article reports on a research project on the Café del Príncipe, a building linked to the theatre of the same name in Madrid, and currently called Teatro Español. Built on a site adjoining the theatre building, Juan de Villanueva conceived it with a dual use, as a service space for the stage box on the one hand, and as a café or botillería on the other. Thanks to the documentation work carried out, it has been possible to rescue an unpublished project by Mariátegui and to date the construction origin of the building itself, taking it back to the last decade of the 18th century and not to the reconstruction of the theatre after the fire of 1802, as was usually attributed.