Fodor's Expert Review Lonja de la Seda

On the Plaza del Mercado, this 15th-century building is a product of Valencia's golden age, when the city's prosperity as one of the capitals of the Corona de Aragón made it a leading European commercial and artistic center. The Lonja, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, was constructed as an expression of this splendor and is widely regarded as one of Spain's finest civil Gothic buildings. Its facade is decorated with ghoulish gargoyles, complemented inside by the high vaulting and slender helicoidal (twisted) columns of the cavernous Contract Hall, one of the building's three separate sections. The upper level of the Pavilion of the Consulate of the Sea is particularly impressive, with its ornate 15th-century wood ceiling.