The Los Vélez area offers lovers of architecture two well-defined construction styles, as there is a deep contrast between villages like María and Chirivel and the more monumental and modernist Vélez Blanco and Vélez Rubio.

Typical in the villages which are closer to the sierra, like María and Chirivel, and at the bottom of valleys gullies, are whitewashed houses of simple construction and austere decoration and narrow steep lanes.

In the streets, decorated with colourful flowers, the whitewashed houses stand one behind another with their Arabic tiled roofs. The typical small square chimneys makes one think of the cold winter months. On the other hand, those of Vélez are much grander, with baroque, modernist and historicist styles, which give the old central areas an extremely interesting aesthetic quality.

Of special interest are the palaces and manors which were built at the time when the area was a feudal estate belonging to the Marquis of Los Vélez. The type of architecture which was predominant during this period had particular features and created a style ­ the classic velezano ­ which is particular to the area. The houses for the wealthy owners had whitewashed and symmetrical façades, with numerous balconies and windows which were decorated with wrought iron elements.