Polanco takes its name from the old Río Polanco, a river that once ran where Avenida Campos Elíseos is today — itself named for a Spanish Jesuit, Juan Alfonso de Polanco, secretary to Saint Ignatius of Loyola. The neighborhood was developed after the Revolution by “De La Lama y Basurto,” the same firm behind Condesa and Las Lomas de Chapultepec, on land that had been Hacienda de Los Morales. Its symbolic starting point is a 1938 obelisk honoring Simón Bolívar at Julio Verne and Reforma. Avenida Presidente Masaryk — the neighborhood's signature street — is named for Tomáš Masaryk, Czechoslovakia's first president, and Polanco has long been shaped by the Spanish, Lebanese, and Jewish communities who settled there over the decades.

Anzures: a ranch that may trace back to the Conquest itself

Anzures has a genuinely older story than anywhere else we cover. The land was once Rancho de los Anzures, bordering Chapultepec forest since colonial times — and by one persistent legend, originally granted to La Malinche, Hernán Cortés's interpreter, after the fall of Tenochtitlan. A chapel to Santa Verónica once stood on the ranch, which is why the neighboring colonia is separately named Verónica Anzures. A London mining company bought the land in 1912, but the Revolution delayed development for over a decade; the ranch was finally subdivided in the 1920s by British industrialist Weetman Pearson, Viscount Cowdray. Real growth came under President Plutarco Elías Calles in the mid-1920s, who kept a property there for its proximity to Chapultepec Castle — the official presidential residence until 1935.

What's happening in Polanco right now, in real numbers

Polanco's current transformation isn't displacement-driven the way Roma's or Doctores' is — it's pure luxury escalation. Armani Residences on Masaryk is Giorgio Armani's first residential project in Mexico City, just 57 ultra-luxury units. Park Hyatt Residences is pricing units at $207,772 pesos per square meter; Ritz-Carlton Residences on Anatole France is close behind. Average luxury pricing across Polanco now tops $120,000 pesos per square meter, with the area appreciating 8-12% a year according to AMPI's 2025 figures — and buildings with amenities like spas and concierge service reselling for 18-25% more than those without.

What Armani's name on the building doesn't tell you

A $207,000-per-square-meter Armani-branded residence in Polanco and a modest 1920s apartment in Anzures get their water the exact same way: through the city's aging municipal system, up into a rooftop tinaco, and down to the tap. Branded luxury upgrades the lobby, the concierge, the finishes — it doesn't automatically upgrade the water infrastructure feeding the building, and a five-year-old tower is not the same thing as a five-year-old plumbing guarantee. That's the actual argument for filtration here, and it cuts against the neighborhood's own reputation: the newest, most expensive address on the block is not a reason to assume the water is any more premium than what's coming out of a tap in Anzures next door.

Sources

  • “Cómo ha evolucionado Polanco, una de las colonias con mayor plusvalía en la CDMX,” Infobae.
  • “Clase alta: Quién fue Polanco y por qué se llama así la colonia de la CDMX,” Dinero en Imagen.
  • “El secreto ‘chic’ de Polanco: Cómo nació el barrio más fancy de México,” México Travel Channel.
  • “La colonia que surgió del antiguo rancho Anzures,” El Universal.
  • “Anzures, el barrio más discreto de la capital mexicana,” MXC.
  • Vive Polanco — Armani Residences, Park Hyatt Residences, Ritz-Carlton Residences project listings; AMPI 2025 plusvalía figures; Knight Frank 2025; Savills Branded Residences 2025/2026.