Echoes of Mashrabiya in Latin America: Reconsidering the Balconies of Lima

In this text, I examine a particular connection between Latin American and Islamic architecture– specifically, the balconies closed with latticework frequently found in several colonial cities of the Americas, but predominantly in Lima, Peru, and their parallelism with the mashrabiya, so frequently observed in the Islamic world. This Latin American version of mashrabiya was associated with medieval Islamic Iberian architecture, whose visual heritage arrived in the Americas with colonial settlement in the 16th century. Lima adopted this particular kind of balcony as one of their most important local symbols. Since then, we have known them as ‘balcones limeños’ (balconies of Lima). This topic has been profusely developed in Latin American literature. I will discuss here the current explanations about the origins of this structure, how this Islamic-inspired architecture arrived in Peru, and why it was so frequently constructed in Lima. Then, I will propose a new interpretation of this singular case, understanding that it is not a foreign or exotic oriental influence, but a typical Latin American feature based on an interest in privacy in architecture– a legacy of the Islamic tradition that ultimately became an internal component of Peruvian societies.

Keywords: architectural connections ; history of wooden architecture ; Islamic architecture ; Latin American colonial architecture ; Latin American mudéjar ; latticed balconies ; Lima's balcony ; mashrabiya ; Peruvian architectural history ; Privacy filters ; screen devices ; South South connections