It is considered the first Art Deco building in Havana, undoubtedly the finest one in this style in Havana. It has a ziggurat (or stepped pyramid) design, terminating in a tower. The 47 meters-high building has 12 storeys, five of which are occupied by the offices. The total covered area of the building is about 7.000 m2, of which about only 560 m2 are used by offices, occupying the five floors of the building.

The facade is covered with shiny red Bavarian granite, golden glazed tiles, brass embellishments and glazed terracotta reliefs of geometric patterns and flowers. These decorative elements points at the influence of the modern Catalonian architecture, and give a wonderful shade effect to the building. The colorful terracotta reliefs of nude nymphs at the top of the building were designed by the American illustrator Maxfield Parrish. The lavishly decorated facade was executed by Arellano y Mendoza at a cost of 500.000 pesos. 

The building is topped with the bronze sculpture of a fruit bat; it is the logo of the Bacardí Company. When Facundo Bacardí Massó, his younger brother José and José Leon Bouteiller founded the Bacardí Company (Bacardí, Bouteiller y Compañía) and opened their first distillery in Santiago de Cuba in 1862, the new blend gained wide acceptance, as it was smooth and mixable, in contrary to the harsh and fiery local rum. Initially the rum was packed in containers that had been used for an olive oil firm that was using the bat figure as its trademark. When the consumers begun to ask the “rum of the bat”, Amalia, Don Facundo’s wife, suggested to use the fruit bat for the company logo, as according to Taíno belief (the native Cuban), fruit bat symbolizes good health, good fortune and family unit. At that time, maybe Amelia had remembered also Facundo’s primitive distillery that were housing a large colony of fruit bats under the tin roof. The fruit bat falls into the category of the megabat and sometimes they are called the flying fox in some locations. Megabats are a suborder of bats that eat fruit. Soon the Bacardí rum was bottled with a black bat on the label. This was a shrewd marketing tactics, as most of the inhabitants were illiterate, but they could recognize the rum with the trademark bat; thus, the Bacardí rum became known also as the rum of the bat. The black bat on a red background continues today as the distinctive logo of Bacardí rums.

At both sides of the entrance door there are two brass embellishments; that one on the left side is a stylized Art Deco version of Havana’s coat of arms. The walls of the portico from the floor upto the ceiling, as well as the two halls of the bar restaurant are covered with Bavarian granite of different colors, laid out in Art Deco pattern. In Cuba the soft green marble was used for the first time in this building. The gold leaf and rose-coloured, pale green and black inlaid marble and granite was imported from different countries of Europe, like Germany, Sweden, Norway, Italy, France, Belgium and Hungary.

The first floor has an area of about thousand square meters and it is about 7 meters high. The first floor contained the famous bar restaurant where once the Bacardí family could watch the bar from the mezzanine with the archway, during they take their dinner and lunch. Even though the bar witnessed many celebrities, in fact most people in Havana didn’t even know that it existed, as it was somewhat the private watering hole of the Bacardi family.

The little-known bar itself is small compared to other bars in Havana. It was made of black wood with large gold diamond reliefs on it. The hall is illuminated by squared Art Deco ceiling lights. Large wooden panels are covering the walls. On all the walls are frosted glass light sconces etched with the famous Bacardi bat. The Bacardí bat motif can also be found throughout the building’s richly decorated interior. The numerous windows are framed by large forged iron grates.

The sumptuous interior details of the building can be summarized as the blue mirrors, stucco reliefs, polished brass embellishments, mahogany and cedar wall panels, mural paintings and stained glass. 

The building has four elevatores. Two elevators had a capacity for 10 persons, whereas the third was used for the transport of the cargo, like the furmniture, and the fourth for the transport of goods from the basement to the bar restaurant on the first floor.

The Bacardí building is not open to the visitors, but you can take your chance to persuade the guard for a few CUC’s to visit the first floor and take the lift up to the tower for an eagle's-eye view.

Nowadays it is surrounded by other tall buildings, so it is difficult to get a panoramic view of its structure from the street level, but the opulent tower can be seen from all over Havana.