The starting point for any Almagro visit just has to be its Plaza Mayor, the hub of the town and meeting point for locals and outsiders alike. It is at once the historical reference and best-known image of this fetching town. The square has its own particular Northern European air (arcaded square packed with windows) and is characterised by its irregular rectangular layout. It hosts the Town Hall and the Casa de los Rosales and Palacio de los Molina, which give the square its particular elegant look. But it is without doubt the Corral de Comediasthat is this town?s main claim to fame. It is the only surviving theatre of this type in Europe, conserving the original structure of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century theatres, based on a large central courtyard surrounded by galleries supported on wooden columns. It is currently the venue of the International Festival of Classical Theatre. Opposite the Corral is the Museo Nacional del Teatro, a museum exhibiting the most varied theatrical documents and objects, bearing witness to the development of this activity from the eighteenth century right down to our days. The square also has gardens, local crafts shops, cafes and tapa bars for unwinding and tasting the town?s main delicacy, marketed under its own Designation of Origin scheme: the aubergine, combined with diverse dishes and wines of La Mancha cuisine.

Perpendicular to the Plaza Mayor run two typical streets, one behind the other, the Calle de San Agustín and the Calle de Carnicerías, both studded with iconic buildings bearing testimony to the rich history of this town. The first we might run into is the Palacio de los Medrano or the well preserved Prison. Next comes the Iglesia de San Bartolomé y de San Agustín and a little further on the nineteenth-century Teatro Municipal, a theatre whose structure and adornments betray the influence of the bourgeois taste of the time. The town is in fact a compendium of the ruling class?s tastes down the ages. The importance of the town?s theatrical tradition can be gauged from the existence of another major theatre, the TeatroHospital de San Juan de Dios.