Puebla, a vice regal city about 80 miles east of Mexico City, is not what anyone would think of as a honeymoon destination, but it can be surprisingly romantic. Along with new hotels, Puebla brims with venerable lodges, perhaps the most famous of these being the Camino Real whose 84 rooms occupy what came into this world as a 16th century convent. And now the city has a Holiday Inn converted from a French-inspired residence built during the Porfiriato. For romance, however, the smaller inns are, to my way of thinking, the most delightful. Hostal Santa María, Hostal Agua Dulce and Mesón San Sebastián all qualify in this respect.
Then you have the Sacristía de Capuchinas and Sacristía de la Compañia, each is rather like an antique store with a few rooms to rent. Most of the furnishings carry a price tag, so, if you see anything you like, just say the word. The proprietor, Leobardo Espinosa is the scion of a family of dealers in ancient wares and his taste is exquisite. These mesones are, it might be added, among the most expensive places to stay in Puebla, although cheap compared to what a hotel room can cost in Mexico City, not to mention Cancun.
Newest and most elegant place to sleep in Puebla is the Inter-Continental Presidente, formerly a Crowne Plaza, recently upgraded at a cost of 14 million dollars. Designed primarily for business travelers, it offers all the standard first world luxuries, right down to a branch of Alfredo di Roma, famous the world over for pasta.
Most unusual Puebla inn is La Purificadora, the Grupo Habita entry. You may know the minimalist Habita in Polanco, or the more hip and cool CondesaDF. The Habita organization also manages two tiny, unusual little inns along the Caribbean and plans to expand. Design is what sets the chain apart from the herd.
In Puebla, simply finding La Purificadora can be a challenge. It lies hidden along a pedestrian walkway by the new convention facility and a stylish shopping center, also on recent vintage. This is the neighborhood where Puebla began along the banks of the Río San Francisco. The river eventually flooded, sending local citizens scurrying to rebuild on higher ground. Toward the end of the last century plans were laid to disinter the buried river and develop restaurants and shops along its shores. Once work began, however, builders encountered the ruins of the original Puebla buried beneath what had become a neighborhood of slums. The decision was made to restore this area and leave the river in underground tubing. Sturdy glass panels in the shopping center floor provide a glimpse a view of the ancient artifacts that were discovered. La Purificadora occupies what had been the site of an ice-making facility.
Ricardo Legorteta, the most famous hotel architect in Mexico, took charge of La Purificadora project. He incorporated some of the ancient walls and much of the antique wood that had been used as beams old railroad ties. Puebla onyx is used extensively in the hotel, but for an artist renowned for favoring dramatic color, being limited to monochrome must have been a challenge. The architect did succeed in including easy chairs upholstered in “bishop’s purple.”
This small hotel, with only 26 rooms, announces that it is different from the moment you enter. Over the reception desk a curiously large sign proclaims the number to call if you have any complaints. Guest rooms are not numbered, but given letters. The spacious dining room – which is the first thing you see – is furnished exclusively with long, large tables seating up to twelve people. This is the way customers dined at the original inns of Puebla. It is the way people eat on cruise ships. While most of us might hesitate to join strangers for a meal, at La Purificadora, I was told, it generally works out quite nicely. Midweek, most of the hotel guests are business travelers, often staying by themselves. This does give them an opportunity to chat with someone when they otherwise might be alone.
The innovation also brings in local folk. “The sale of food and drink accounts for nearly three-quarters of our revenue,” said Miguel Angel Puerta, who recently arrived from Barcelona to take over as general manager. Cuisine may be the best in Puebla, quite an accomplishment in a city that gave the world mole as well as chiles en nogada. Libations, along with pizza, are served in the top floor cocktail lounge with a roof that opens to the sky. Customers, as well as hotel guests, tend to be what I assume are young urban professionals who prefer comfortable dress to high fashion.
La Purificadora on occasion seems to sacrifice comfort to design, but management does show imagination. The rooftop swimming pool is long and narrow, designed for exercise, not frolic. Floors in the guest rooms are monochromatic tile. Showers are wainscoted. Instead of the traditional bit of candy on a pillow, the chambermaid leaves a tiny box containing two ear plugs. Puebla, like Rome, is a city of many churches and many church bells.
The historic center, where, as you might expect, the historic hotels are located, makes Puebla the romantic city that it is. A lone guitarist, or maybe a trio, will be playing in the tiny cafes tucked along the Plazuela de los Sapos (Toad Square) or above the Barrio Artistico. Los Sapos is to Puebla what the Left Bank once was to Paris. The bars and bistros rely for business on students and those who wish they were students. Los Artistas caters to customers who might be characters in La Boheme. Avenida Juárez is nightlife alley, crowded with discos and such, better than anything else this side of Acapulco, but not what I would call romantic.
Actually, what I call romantic is the Paseo de San Francisco and its Corredor Gastronómico, where a couple can dine on chalupas, mole and enjoy chiles en nogada any month of the year. At one of the Sacristias they offer guests classes in preparing red and green sauce, pepian, even arroz con leche (rice pudding). Mole apparently is a bit too complicated. So, too, is the creation of camotes, jamoncillos and other candies that first emerged for the kitchens at the Santa Clara Convent. Nogada (creamed walnuts), you will hear, first was concocted at the Santa Monica nunnery, which survived clandestinely behind secret doorways for more than half-a-century after the Reform Laws banned religious orders. Today it is a museum.
Puebla gave the world not only the best in Mexican cuisine (indeed, they say corn was first cultivated in the valleys surrounding Tehuacan) but also the Talavera plates upon which gastronomic delights traditionally are served. The original Talavera, to be sure, was produced by immigrants from Spain. Although today Puebla can claim to be the most Mexican city in Mexico, it began as the first truly Spanish settlement in New Spain. Spaniards built it where no other indigenous city had existed before. Even today, its best remembered personality was a foreigner, an Oriental princess brought to the city as a slave and who is celebrated today for her colorful costumes (creole ladies wore only black), La China Poblana. What other place else has produced such a romantic tale?
Add to that the fin de sicle French architecture and design of many structures in the historic center. They hark back to the era of Toulouse Lautrec, Gigi and Moulin Rouge, all out of the golden age of romance. Puebla indeed is a city made for love.
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