Spanish Steps (Washington D.C.) Spanish Steps (Washington D.C.) The Spanish Steps are an urban arrangement in the Kalorama neighborhood of Washington, D.C., on 22nd Street NW just south of S Street NW. Inspired by the City Beautiful movement, the steps accommodate a steep difference of level between S Street and the parallel immediately to the south, Decatur Place NW. Named with reference to the Spanish Steps in Rome, though obviously of no comparable scale and grandeur, they were designed by local architect George Oakley Totten Jr. for the Municipal Office of Public Works and Grounds, and built in 1905. A granite lion-head fountain is
Spanish Steps of the English Romantic generation. On the same right side stands the 15th-century former cardinal Lorenzo Cybo de Mari's palace, now Ferrari di Valbona, a building altered in 1936 to designs by Marcello Piacentini, the main city planner during Fascism, with modern terraces perfectly in harmony with the surrounding baroque context. At the top, the stairway ramp up the "Pincio" which is the Pincian Hill. From the top of the steps the Villa Medici can be reached. During Christmas time a 19th-century criba manger is displayed on the first landing of the staircase. During Springtime, just before the anniversary of