Alongside the Cementerio de la Recoleta, lays the Iglesia de Nuestra Señora de Pilar, a Baroque-style colonial church consecrated in 1732, is a national historical monument. Within easy walking distance are the important Centro Cultural Ciudad de Buenos Aires, the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes (Fine Arts Museum), the Centro Municipal de Exposiciones, which hosts book fairs and other cultural events, and the monolithic Biblioteca Nacional (National Library).

Recoleta's many attractive public gardens and open spaces include Plaza Intendente Alvear, Plaza Francia (where the capital's largest crafts fair takes place on Sundays) and other parks stretching into Palermo and Belgrano.

Among the monumental buildings is the neo-Gothic Facultad de Ingenieria (Engineering School) at the corner of Av. Las Heras and Azcuenaga. The work of Uruguayan architect Arturo Prins, the never completed building intended as the Facultad de Derecho (Law School) lacks the pointed ogival towers characteristic of the style.