Plaza de España

Built for the 1929 Ibero-American Exposition and far larger in person than in photographs. The curved facade runs 200 metres, a canal follows it, and four tiled bridges cross the water — each one a ready-made frame.

Two shots carry a session here. From the centre of the plaza, wide, with the towers at either end and the whole arc behind your subjects. Then close, on one of the bridges, using the painted ceramic balustrade as foreground.

The forty-eight alcoves along the wall, one per Spanish province, are each tiled with a map and a historical scene — a corridor of colour that photographs beautifully in the shade while the plaza itself is blinding.