Beldia House/ Villa Mercedes

Overview

The Beldia House, also known as Villa Mercedes, is a heritage structure in Poblacion I, Tagbilaran City, Bohol, built in 1858 by Don Esteban Butalid, a gobernadorcillo (town head) and businessman. It is classified under Unique Cultural Heritage in the provincial tourist-attraction inventory and is also listed in the Philippines’ national inventory of cultural properties. The structure is located in the historic core of Tagbilaran, near other listed heritage houses including the Reyes House (Tandoc House) and the Rocha-Suarez House.

The house carries a direct link to José Rizal’s family: Don Manuel Timoteo Hidalgo — Rizal’s brother-in-law, married to his sister Saturnina — stayed in the house for four months during his exile to Bohol (January and again December 1889); Rizal himself is thought to have visited in 1894. During the Spanish colonial period the house also served for a time as a provisional municipio (town hall).

Architecturally, the house is distinguished within the province by a floating volada (overhanging upper gallery) set atop massive coral-stone ground-floor walls, and a curving gambrel roof of clay tiles — a roof form the sources describe as unique in Bohol and giving the house a distinctly Chinese-influenced silhouette. The Neo-Classic façade carries pilasters with Composite capitals carved from coral stone beneath a three-centred arch and classic architrave; the house was originally U-shaped around an internal courtyard, since roofed over to form the main entrance. Judge Antonio Beldia purchased the property in 1971 from the Butalid-Calceta-Gallares family corporation, hence the current “Beldia House” name. The upper floor has since seen alterations — jalousie windows have replaced the original wooden panels — but the coral-stone base and roofline survive. The house remains privately owned by the Beldia family — descendants of Judge Antonio Beldia — and is administered by architect Norma Beldia; no source describes it as generally open to public visitation. On October 9, 2023, the National Museum of the Philippines formally declared the Beldia House an Important Cultural Property (ICP), jointly with the Tagbilaran City government, and presented the family a bronze ICP marker.

Location

Poblacion I, Tagbilaran City, Bohol. Tagbilaran is the provincial capital of Bohol, accessible by air (Bohol-Panglao International Airport) and by sea (Tagbilaran Port). Poblacion I is within the historic downtown area of the city, near Plaza Rizal Park and St. Joseph the Worker Cathedral.

Getting There

From any point in Tagbilaran City, Poblacion I is reachable on foot from the city center or by short tricycle ride. The house sits in the Sitio Ubos heritage cluster along Calle Franklin, a small road connecting to the Butalid Causeway that links Tagbilaran to Panglao Island, roughly 600 metres from the city’s present-day commercial district. No formal street-number address is published in available sources, but the house is directly across Calle Franklin from the Hontanosas House and a short distance east of Casa Rocha-Suarez.

Practical Info

The Beldia House is privately owned by the Beldia family (heirs of Judge Antonio Beldia) and administered by architect Norma Beldia, who represented the family when the National Museum of the Philippines declared the house an Important Cultural Property on October 9, 2023. No source indicates the house is open for scheduled public tours or visits by arrangement; it is best experienced as an exterior/streetscape stop along Calle Franklin in the Sitio Ubos heritage cluster, alongside the Rocha, Rocha-Suarez, and Hontanosas houses.

What to Expect

Tagbilaran’s Poblacion I retains a cluster of surviving pre-war and early twentieth-century ancestral houses that form an informal heritage circuit. The Beldia House/Villa Mercedes sits near the Reyes House, Rocha-Suarez House, Plaza Rizal, and St. Joseph the Worker Cathedral, making it part of a walkable heritage route through the city center.

From Calle Franklin, passers-by can make out the house’s most distinguishing features without needing interior access: the floating volada gallery, the curving Chinese-influenced gambrel roof of clay tiles, the massive coral-stone ground-floor walls, and the Neo-Classic entrance with its coral-stone pilasters and three-centred arch. Since October 2023 the house also carries a bronze Important Cultural Property marker from the National Museum of the Philippines, visible from outside.

Notes

Historical and architectural detail per the List of Cultural Properties of the Philippines in Tagbilaran (Wikipedia) and The Ancestral Houses of Sitio Ubos, Tagbilaran City, Bohol (B.L.A.S.T. heritage-houses blog), both accessed 2026-07-17 — cross-checked and consistent on the 1858 construction date and Rizal-family connection.

Source: BPTO Table 11 — Inventory of Tourist Attractions, Bohol Tourism Profile Eco Dev 2025.

2026-07-28 follow-up research resolved four outstanding tags:

• Street location (Calle Franklin, Sitio Ubos) and the house’s position relative to the Hontanosas House and Casa Rocha-Suarez: CASA ROCHA: “Balay na Tisa sa Bohol” (National Museum of the Philippines, Filipino-language), accessed 2026-07-28. No formal street-number address was found in any source checked.
• Private ownership, current administrator (architect Norma Beldia), and the October 9, 2023 National Museum of the Philippines Important Cultural Property (ICP) declaration: Reinvigorating Tagbilaran City’s heritage houses, plaza (Bohol Island News), accessed 2026-07-28.
• Corroborating architectural and ownership detail cross-checked against Beldia (Bohol Vintage Houses blog) and Sitio Ubos: What Happens When We Lose Heritage (BluPrint), both accessed 2026-07-28.
• No source found (Wikipedia, National Museum, Bohol Island News, Bohol Vintage Houses, BluPrint, benjielayug.com) states the house is open for scheduled public tours, has visiting hours, or accepts visits by arrangement — treated as a genuine gap rather than re-tagged as unresolved, since the private-ownership/administrator facts above answer the practical “who do I ask” question even though a formal access policy could not be confirmed.