Santa Caterina Market and neighborhood: old Town renovation

Barcelona, Spain

Photo © Miralles Tagliabue EMBT

Photo © Alex Gaultier

Photo © Miralles Tagliabue EMBT

Photo © Alex Gaultier

arkkitehdit: Miralles/Tagliabue - EMBT

Location: Avinguda Francesc Cambó S/N, 08001 Barcelona, Spain
Year: 2005

A competition was opened to restore the Santa Caterina city market located in the old quarter of Barcelona in 1997. EMBT won the bid with a proposal that aimed at incorporating the extreme complexity of the setting itself by creating a commercial market complemented by a residential zone and public spaces that integrated all the activities of the neighborhood. The project maintains parts of the existing structure and the architects proposed a new and creative render of the area which respected the history and context of the site. The proposal superimposes new architecture on old, mixes them, and comes up with a conglomerate, a hybrid that accentuates usefulness and is contemporary. The interior distribution of the market was reorganized; there are fewer stands but the access and service systems are rationalized; the surface area of public spaces gains ground and communicates with the Avinguda Francesc Cambó, an important transitional vein in the neighborhood also surrounded by a dense network of narrow streets