The harrowing fate of the Central Post Office building and how it is rising from the ashes

Manila was once coined by Nick Joaquin as “the city of our affections” in his acclaimed play and seminal work, A Portrait of the Artist as Filipino. Somehow, it alludes to the colonial charm that its city architecture has evoked throughout the centuries. There is Intramuros, with its cobblestone streets lined by Hispanic mansions, towering churches, and neoclassical buildings. There is Escolta, with its art deco edifices and motifs, theatres, and thriving contemporary art scene. There is Binondo, the oldest Chinatown in the world that continues to uphold its rich commercial heritage. And a lot more districts, streets and alleys that showcase the Philippines’ connection to the rest of the world. It is these affections of ours—for our past, nations across the globe, and our diverse culture as Filipinos—that inspired many great men in our history to build landmarks distinctive of Manila.

“Manila’s greatest [period] will always be remembered with the existence of compelling structures that speak of progress and development [which at that time had an efficient and modern postal system]. The Central Post Office building is a city landmark like the Manila City Hall Clock Tower,” says Ronald Flores, the chief tourism operations officer of the Department of Tourism, Culture, and the Arts of Manila (DTCAM).

Tourists flock to either Liwasang Bonifacio in Lawton or along Escolta Street to take a photo of this towering neoclassical building, designed and built in 1926 by Filipino architects Juan Arellano and Tomas Mapua and the American Ralph Doane. With access to Binondo, Sta Cruz, Quiapo, and Intramuros, the Central Post Office has always been a starting point for newcomers who want to roam around Manila. For almost a century, it has been a treasure trove of communication and a silent eyewitness to the Filipino nation’s storied past.

“The building’s neoclassical and beaux-arts architecture captures the splendour of a time when important public structures were built to signify development and modernisation,” Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) Undersecretary David Almirol, Jr says.

But that cherished identity has been relegated to the people’s memory by the devastating fire.

Smoke billowed over the city on the morning of May 22, as the firefighters controlled the situation and declared fire out a day later. The intensity of the MCPO’s fire left 18 casualties, 16 of whom were firefighters. The fire razed a multi-million peso worth of interiors and about Php300 million worth of assets.

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The horrific accident left historians, art and architecture patrons and enthusiasts alike in despair and broke the hearts of many of its workers and retirees. Dacasin relays that newly appointed postmaster general and CEO of PHLPost Luis Carlos believes restoring the structure would take three to five years. Temporarily, the MCPO employees are scattered across Metro Manila: the Central Mail Exchange Center along Domestic Road, the Quezon City Central Post Office, and the Surface Mail Exchange in the Delpan Port Area for mail and parcel transactions.

The restoration now rests in the hands of the national government through the Inter-Agency Task Force on Cultural Heritage, composed of the National Commission for Culture and the Arts, the National Museum and the National Historical Commission of the Philippines, all in partnership with PHLPost.