Palacio de las Cortes

The Palacio de las Cortes, also called the Palace of the Congress of Deputies, stands on the Plaza de las Cortes in Madrid and is the seat of the Congress of Deputies, the lower house of the Spanish Cortes Generales. Designed by architect Narciso Pascual Colomer and completed in 1850, the building presents a Neoclassical, Renaissance palace style facade over two floors, the lower level rusticated in stone and the upper marked by windows under triangular pediments. Its main entrance carries six Corinthian columns supporting a pediment decorated with allegorical figures of virtues and national themes, and a monumental staircase flanked by two bronze lions, cast from cannons captured during the African War of 1860 and named Daoiz and Velarde after two military heroes, leads up to the portico.