Museo Cerralbo

If you've ever wondered what it was like to be obscenely wealthy in 19th-century Madrid, this is your answer. The Museo Cerralbo is the former home of the 17th Marquis of Cerralbo, Enrique de Aguilera y Gamboa — politician, poet, archaeologist, and compulsive collector. Over his lifetime (1845-1922), the Marquis and his family amassed over 50,000 objects: paintings, sculptures, ceramics, tapestries, furniture, clocks, weapons, armor, coins, medals, and archaeological finds from excavations across Spain and Europe.

The palace itself was built between 1883 and 1893 with a dual purpose: to be a family home and a museum. The Marquis designed the rooms specifically to display his collection, and the result is a Neo-Baroque fever dream of gilded mirrors, crystal chandeliers, and velvet-draped salons crammed with art from floor to ceiling. The Ballroom alone, with its ceiling paintings and sparkling fixtures, rivals anything in the Royal Palace. Works by El Greco, Zurbaran, Tintoretto, and Van Dyck hang on the walls alongside hundreds of lesser-known but equally beautiful pieces.

When the Marquis died in 1922, he bequeathed the entire palace and its contents to the Spanish state on one condition: that everything remain exactly where he had placed it. The museum opened in 1944, and a few decades later was declared a Historic-Artistic Monument and Asset of Cultural Interest. It's one of the few 19th-century aristocratic palaces in Madrid that still has its original decoration intact.

Almost nobody comes here. While the Prado and Reina Sofia draw millions, the Cerralbo sees a fraction of those visitors — which makes it one of the most pleasant museum experiences in the city. Entry is free on Saturdays and Sundays. You walk through rooms that look exactly as the Marquis left them a century ago, and the only sound is your footsteps on the parquet.