New guide to Ecuadorian haciendas: ‘A story to touch’

when he talks about Haciendas, Travels Through The History of Ecuador You can see the emotion of Philipp Schauer, German ambassador to Ecuador, during an interview via Zoom. He gives the impression that, since his arrival in Ecuador in August 2019, his plans to write a book on the architecture of Ecuador was a subject that he could not let go. It’s something he’s passionate about. Thus he left it registered in other publications in Bolivia and Mozambique, when he rendered his services in those countries.

This short time in the country has not been a problem for the diplomat, who has been in his career for 35 years, having made a tour of the Sierra and Coast of Ecuador, a tour that also served to soak up its culture and learn something of its history.

In Latin America he also worked in Venezuela, in fact it was his first position 30 years ago during the government of Carlos Andrés Pérez; he spent 10 years in Bolivia. In Africa, he worked in some countries and regions. In Europe she worked in Albania and England.

“I am very interested in architecture and I realized that the cities of Quito and Cuenca already have many good quality books that talk about their attractions, but perhaps they are not always very practical to carry during a tour. But regarding the field there is not much information, perhaps because there is not much left of the old or very valuable modern architecture. Almost all the old churches have collapsed -which is very sad- so what remains are the haciendas. That’s why I focused on them, something that The beginning was a bit difficult because I was not sure if it would be worth it since they are difficult to find and many times you cannot visit them and get to know them from the inside. There is also no very precise guide, but in the end I think I was quite successful thanks to several people who put me in contact with the owners, who in turn told me that there were other haciendas here and there,” he says.

The mechanic Schauer used was simple: Google Earth. “There are many haciendas and some say they are very old, but in the end, in certain cases, if you visit the buildings they are not like that. So I contacted those people and they received me very kindly -something that is common in Ecuador-. This is how I managed to locate them and get information.”

In order to capture this adventure, Philipp Schauer had to dedicate a year and a half to it starting in the second half of 2020. “After a vacation I decided to make the book by first visiting the haciendas closest to Quito (the city where he lives and works)”.

In Pichincha he was in Los Chillos, Machachi, Mejía, Tumbaco, Mitad del Mundo, Cayambe, then he advanced to the provinces of Imbabura, Carchi, Cotopaxi, Chimborazo, Azuay and Loja in the Sierra.

The 152-page, full-color guide won’t fit in a pocket, but it’s an ideal size for convenient portability. The first pages are dedicated to the mountain haciendas and, from the 122, begins the tour of the Coast, where he visited houses in Los Ríos, Guayas and Manabí. Near the end, the author has printed screenshots of Google Earth facilitating the location of each hacienda.

While browsing the guide in English, the reader becomes aware of the contribution and synthesis achieved by Schauer by offering historical information on the places, the people who lived there, their owners, and the haciendas. He also explains with precise data how to get to each site.

The book is dedicated to Benita, his wife, who, in the words of the diplomat himself, “was very patient with me, due to my absences and for having dedicated less time to family occupations (laughs)”.

His family is also made up of his three children aged 18, 16 and 14. The journey she made through the Ecuadorian Coast and Highlands to find the central motif of her book was done alone. “Is not a hobby very familiar,” says Schauer. “My children have no interest in farms and my wife’s is relative. What we did do together was when they invited us to spend a Saturday at noon, I would say that they invited us four or six times. I did most of the route alone, but if it was a Saturday or Sunday I did it with my wife”.

Schauer, born in Stockholm, explains the reason for his interest in architecture. “It is difficult to explain. It may be something genetic. I have visited many buildings and the most interesting thing is being able to enter and see it from the inside. My grandfather made a heritage guide in Germany, my parents (German diplomats) have always been interested in museums and I personally love visiting churches because they have the advantage of getting to know them because they are almost always open. In Bolivia, for example, I focused on churches and chapels. That country has great wealth in that sense. I also like private houses, as long as they have an aesthetic and historical value”.

The diplomat managed to collect 105 farms and to obtain this figure he had to visit around 200. In one day it was up to eight. What caught your attention the most? “That they are very different, there is not a very specific type, some rise in very beautiful landscapes. Thanks to this landscape-farm combination, for me it is the main wealth that Ecuador has, its landscapes are impressive, it is the most impressive. Another aspect that I found was that, in some sense, they have the ease of access; you ask if you can have a look and they usually say ‘no problem’. That is the way in which you can see things that many do not see because from the road it is not possible, you have to get off, enter and go, which becomes a beautiful adventure”.

Philip, 63, stresses the importance of a nation’s architectural heritage. “First because it makes a country attractive, not only for tourism but also for its inhabitants. For me, old buildings are beautiful, they have an aesthetic value. Second, because they represent historical identity. You cannot understand your country without knowing its history. It is much more impressive to know the history through the buildings and, in the case of the haciendas, it is exciting to find out how the landowners lived, if they had a lot of money or not, if they lived there or not, if there were important events and people in them . The buildings are like a way to approach them. There are legends of Manuelita Sáenz, for example, that she met Simón Bolívar in a hacienda near Quito. The story can also be told through a house. For me a building is like a story to touch”.

Schauer plans to put this guide online, a project he would do together with his wife. The ideal would be to raise one farm per week, he says. “It would be nice. Hopefully I can achieve it, because my work deserves attention too. I would like a Spanish version. Another idea I have is to do something with Guayaquil because I was there recently and I toured the center, where I discovered some very nice buildings. oh! I want to congratulate EL UNIVERSO for the bicentennial supplement, I collected them and in some pages they talk about heritage buildings in Guayaquil. I must also say that there is less information about the buildings of that city, not as it happens with the haciendas of the Sierra”.

The guide can be purchased at La Española, Mr. Books and Librimundi bookstores. “I am proud to have found some haciendas on the Coast because that is much more difficult to find than in the Sierra and in Google Earth they cannot be seen. For this topic I had Mr. Sebastián Yela as a reference, who was my guide in Vinces and I also reviewed a book from the Prefecture of Guayas on hacienda houses, but in the latter most were new or remodeled houses, but I managed to highlight three old ones in the guide”, concludes Schauer.