page_title: United States Customs House (Ponce, Puerto Rico)
section_title: Building Description
hierarchical_section_title: United States Customs House (Ponce, Puerto Rico) / Building Description
caption_attribution_description: English: U.S Customs House in Ponce, Puerto Rico. Second floor stair hall and stair arcade, looking northwest.
context_page_description: The U.S. Customs House, located at Bonaire and Aduana streets in barrio La Playa, Ponce, Puerto Rico, is the oldest customs house in Puerto Rico, and the only one of its type under the U.S. flag. As of 10 February 1988, the building was owned by the U.S. Customs Service, Washington, D.C. The building is listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places as "U.S. Custom House". It was listed on 10 February 1988.
context_section_description: The building is a Spanish-period building which was remodeled by the United States in 1924, with small changes since then. The two-story building has massive masonry walls and large arched entrances to a central courtyard that reflects its Spanish origins, while the false partial gables with Spanish barrel tiles are typical of the United States Spanish Revival architectural work of the 1920s. The building is situated on the waterfront facing the Caribbean Sea and next to the port of Ponce, two miles from the center of this second-largest city in Puerto Rico. The customs house fully occupies a small city block. Its principal facade faces Bonaire Street and looks toward the ocean across a grassed area containing a Coast Guard beacon. It is located in an area of traditional warehouses, commercial buildings, mostly one-story and many from the Spanish period. There is a sidewalk around the four sides of the building, with the one on Bonaire Street wider and providing three mature trees.
  The building is a simple rectangle measuring 97 feet wide x 83 feet deep. The plan is typical of Spanish construction, with interconnected rooms, around the outside perimeter that also open to a central courtyard. There is a wide arched vehicular passage leading from the front through the courtyard to the rear exit from the building. The original courtyard has been partially closed in on the first floor only on each side of the passageway to create two additional rooms. Between the front rooms and the courtyard, a fine masonry staircase rises on the left side off the central passage. The second floor repeats the first-floor layout of perimeter rooms with later modifications, but includes the full extent of the original courtyard or patio in the center. Originally there may have been a roofed courtyard gallery for circulation around the courtyard. At present, there are two short modern gallery sections bridging between the quarry-tile-paved roofs of the infilled first-floor courtyard areas. At the head of the stairs is a large public lobby that opens to the courtyard and to the front of the building. There is also a small circular iron stair to the roof from the southeast corner of the second-floor courtyard.
  The facades are similar with regular door and window openings and with small balconies to the second-floor openings. There is a small partial false gable roof of Spanish barrel red-clay tiles around the four sides and around the courtyard. On the front (south) facade, facing the ocean, there are five bays with a large elliptical arch-headed passageway large enough for vehicular traffic. It is architecturally marked only by a plain, flat frame painted differently from the body of the building. There are plain board, double doors with a smaller pedestrian port in the right door. In the elliptical arch there is a simple fanlight window. Flanking the arched entrance are two large high windows on each side. The windows are two-leaf casements with exterior solid and Jouvered combination paneled shutters. Metal grilles are at each window. The walls have a simple low projecting base course, and the first floor walls are marked by horizontal incised coursing, all in stucco. There is a large molded string course between stories and on the second floor, five door openings, each with double-leaf doors that are half sash, which replaced the original louvered and paneled shutter combinations. Over the doors are sashed transoms, although the right group has been replaced by air conditioners. Each opening has a decorative wrought iron balcony with scroll support dating from the U.S. remodeling of the building. Previous to these wrought-iron balconies, the building had cast iron railings. "U.S. Customs" is lettered over the central window. At the top is a large double masonry molded cornice, surmounted by the small false partial gable in Spanish tiles, both from 1924. On the front only, there are three flag poles on the roof, and a large antenna system. On each side of the first floor passage entry is an alarm box and a plain light fixture.
  The rear facade
caption: U.S Customs House in Ponce, Puerto Rico. Second floor stair hall and stair arcade, looking northwest.
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