Medellin

Medellina is the second largest city in Colombia after Bogota and one of the largest ones in population with 2.3 million inhabitants. It was founded in the year 1616 by Francisco Herrera Y Campuzano and in 1826 was named capital of the Department of Antioquia, one of 32 departments of Colombia. This city produces 11% of the economy of all Colombia and is known in the region for it’s universities, academies, industry, science, festivals etc. Medellina is one of the leading industrial regions in Colombia , where some of the main products that are exported around the world are coffee and textile. In the 1950s, Paul Lester Wiener and Jose Luis Sert architected a project called “Medellin Master Plan”, a plan which would make the city the first metropolitan area in Colombia. It was designed very carefully and everything was planed, where some of the features where : the creation of an industrial zone, the construction of a city stadium etc. But in 1948, after the murder of presidential candidate Jorge Eliecer Gaitan, political violence spread and the people that where in rural areas, started to come to the city and from around 300,000 inhabitants it had, that number trebled. And now that the city was overpopulated with slums and more people that it was made for, the plan “Medellin Master Plan” didn’t work. The city has an area of 382 km² divided in 16 districts and has a tropical climate with a average annual temperature of 22°C. Some of the most famous festivals and events that take place in Medellin are : Festival of the flowers, international poetry festival, international tango festival, international jazz festival etc.