Nowhere in the world has such a concentration of football clubs as Buenos Aires, where there are more than 60 stadia located within an hour of the city centre. Forgetting for a moment the recent success of Lionel Messi and his charges on the pitch, Argentina’s footballing prowess is perhaps nowhere more evident than in the café-bar El Banderín, which is celebrating over 100 years as a city landmark and perfectly encapsulates the country’s obsession with the beautiful game.
El Banderín is one of 80 bar notables in Buenos Aires, a label the city bestows upon bars and cafés it deems to be of historic or architectural significance. The venue boasts more than 500 hundred relics of footballing identity, its memorabilia-laden walls making it renowned even in a city and a country where football permeates everyday porteño life. From the world-famous River Plates and Boca Juniors to the much smaller, more humble Berazategui and Excursioniastas, the bar features a vast array of keepsakes relating to local sporting institutions, interspersed among which are items from around the world, showing a respectful regard for the game’s unifying power.
Even without the fútbol, El Banderín would be a bar notable well worth a visit. Like its equally esteemed siblings scattered across the City of Fury, it boasts old wooden countertops, a heavy-duty coffee machine, glass soda siphons, Quilmes on draught, a noisily whirling ceiling fan and window lettering in the local fileteado style: all hallmarks of a drinking den rich in porteño character and charm, with a century of stories steeped in its walls.
Don Justo and María Riesco emigrated from the Asturias region of northwestern Spain in the early 20th Century, settling in the neighbourhood of Almagro. On the corner of Billinghurst and Guardia Vieja the couple opened the almacen El Asturiano, a traditional neighbourhood grocery store selling cold cuts of meat and bottles of Cinzano to almagrenses.
El Asturiano and its ilk not only sold essential provisions but also served as places where locals could congregate to chat over a glass of vermú or a round of truco, a popular Argentinian card game.
In the 1960s, with new, giant supermarkets squeezing the smaller grocery stores out of business, the Riescos decided to focus solely on hospitality. Don Justo had passed baton to his son, Mario, an avid supporter of the football team Club Atlético River Plate, one of Argentina and indeed South America’s biggest sporting institutions. A supporter since the mid-1940s – a period when La Máquina, River Plate’s famous attacking line, played some astonishing football – Don Mario began hanging small club trinkets from the walls. Friends would bring footballing souvenirs back to Buenos Aires from trips abroad, while the clientele contributed memorabilia from their local teams, and very quickly it the bar became associated with el banderín, or football pendant.
By the 1970s it was time for a name change: El Asturiano duly became El Banderín, reflecting its character and USP. Football players and other notable guests popped by, occasionally leaving a signed photograph or jersey to add to the bulging collection. Tourists were so charmed that, on returning home, they would frequently post their own contributions to hang alongside all the other keepsakes.
El Banderín is now in the care of Luis Sarni, a former taxi driver who, finding the corner of Billinghurst and Guardia Vieja a convenient place to park up, would drop by every morning for a coffee and a medialuna. His love for the place was such that the Riesco family, who became friends of his, decided he was the man to take the reins. ‘This is a piece of living history,’ he tells me. ‘This place completely captured me. It’s a refuge for people of all ages; we have patrons aged 80 who come every day and we have 16-year-olds who love our picadas.’
Sarni, also a River Plate fan, has contributed his own pennants to the bar, which has the feel of a museum nowadays. ‘My favourite is over 50 years old, a Yupanqui banderín.’ While there may be more than 500 items here already, there’s always room for more, though ‘the only condition is that it tells a story. We don’t want anything new, and we don’t want banderines from clubs we already have. There’s not enough room [on the walls for] repetitions!’
When asked what might be missing from El Banderín, Sarni smiles and simply says: ‘Nothing, really. But as a huge fan of Lionel Messi, I’d love to see a photo or a banderín of his hanging here someday.’
