This beautiful space next to the lake belongs to the National Autonomous University of Mexico and as of 1959 has served as a cultural center with an array of exhibitions, concerts, theater, dance and movie showings.

Its founding director was the renowned Jalisco writer Juan José Arreola. The building was commissioned by Porfirio Díaz in the early twentieth century as a summer home. Later on, it became the Automobile Club of Mexico City, where the Porfirista aristocracy would meet.

During the Revolution, it housed the Centro de Reparto Agrario (Center for the Agricultural Redistribution), and between 1929 and 1959 it was the headquarters of the Biology Institute of the UNAM. Nowadays it is one of the most attractive and historic cultural venues of the city, by virtue of its beautiful Porfiriano style architecture and it´s location in the heart of Chapultepec forest.