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From 1913 to 1920, the national celebration (bullfighting) gained such an important status that Madrid's former main bullring in Carretera de Aragon was not big enough. It was José Gómez Ortega "Joselito" who declared that a new "monumental" bullring had to be built, to open this piece of heritage and culture to the whole city of Madrid. His friend and architect José Espeliu began to work on the project.

A family called Jardón gave the land to the Deputy of Madrid, provided that they could run the arena for fifty years. The deputation accepted the proposal on November 12, 1920. On March 19, 1922, in the exact center of the prospective arena, the first stone was placed. The construction of the bullring would cost 12 million pesetas (4.5 million over budget), and it would replace the old bullring, dating from 1874.

"Las Ventas" was finished in 1929 and two years later, June 17, 1931, a charity bullfight was held with a full capacity crowd to inaugurate it. Bullfighting stopped during the Spanish Civil War and did not resume until May 1939.

In 1996, Australian rock band AC/DC performed at the Las Ventas for their Ballbreaker tour. They recorded the performance on DVD for the concert video, "AC/DC: No Bull", as a reference to the fact they were playing at a bullfighting arena, with no bull present.

In 2008, it was converted into an indoor tennis clay court and the Spanish Davis Cup Team, lead by the rampant Rafael Nadal played their semifinal against the United States, and won it in front of their home crowd.

Source : Wikipedia.org