King Philip IV commissioned Rubens and Velázquez to decorate the Torre

The Torre de la Parada was a former hunting lodge built by Luis de Vega in 1547-1549. It was located in Monte de El Pardo in Fuencarral-El Pardo, near the Royal Palace of El Pardo, some way outside Madrid in the Sierra de Guadarrama.

In the years 1635-1640, King Philip IV of Spain commissioned the architect Juan Gómez de Mora to renovate the lodge. He hired leading painters, including Rubens and Velázquez, who contributed portraits and other works to the decoration. Rubens was specifically commissioned to produce sixty mythological paintings in about 18 months, assisted by various artists including Jacob Jordaens and Cornelis de Vos.

Forty of the mythological paintings survive, as well as many of Rubens' oil sketches and drawings. Most of these works are now in the Prado in Madrid. A travel book from 1806 describes paintings by Flemish painters such as Paul de Vos and Erasmus Quellinus II that were once at the site.

The Torre de la Parada was mostly destroyed by fire when taken in 1714 by Austrian troops in the War of Spanish Succession, though the ruins remain.

Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons