Green light for the expansion of the Zara store in Plaça Catalunya: five floors and more than 5,500 m²

The Zara flagship store in Plaça Catalunya, at the corner of Carrer Bergara in Barcelona, ​​is getting even bigger. The Barcelona City Council gave the green light this Friday to the expansion project for Amancio Ortega's brand, which is expected to occupy a total of 5,643 square meters spread across five floors. Of this, 3,779 square meters will be dedicated to retail.² The space will be used for retail. The plan was already approved by the Eixample district council and the city council's Ecology and Urban Planning Commission last week, and has now been ratified by the full City Council with votes in favor from the PSC, Junts, PP, and Vox parties. Barcelona en Comú and ERC voted against it. With this expansion, the Plaça Catalunya store, already the largest Zara retail location in Barcelona, ​​will also become one of the brand's largest stores worldwide. Fifth Deputy Mayor Raquel Gil emphasized that the change only involves using a third floor—currently vacant—for retail, and does not entail constructing a new building or expanding the existing one. The other groups that voted in favor of the measure echoed this sentiment, stressing that the store is already a well-established presence in the city center. Barcelona en Comú and Esquerra, however, have warned that the rise of large brands in the center of the Catalan capital is detrimental to local businesses, and therefore voted against the expansion. Currently, the store occupies basement level -1, the ground floor, the first floor, and the second floor. It will now also occupy the third floor, which means exceeding the 2,500 m² threshold for sales area and, therefore, requires the approval of a Special Plan, in accordance with municipal regulations. Specifically, until now, the retail space was 2,324 square meters, and with the expansion, it will increase to 3,779 square meters, an increase of 1,455 m². Changes in downtown retail

The building, where Zara has had its flagship store since 2016, is popularly known as the BBVA building. It was designed by the architect Eugenio Pedro Cendoya in the early 1950s as the local headquarters of Banco de Bilbao, and became well-known in the Catalan capital as a banking and administrative building, until Amancio Ortega bought it in 2013 for around 80 million euros from the German fund Deka Immobilien.

Although no specific date has yet been set for the start of the renovations or the opening of the new plant, this expansion coincides with other developments in the city center, such as the movement of the iconic FNAC store in the Triangle, which has moved to the Rambla and has, in turn, replaced by a MediaMarkt.

The main criticisms come from ERC, which argues that these types of expansions cause the city center to "lose its identity" and harm local businesses; and also from Barcelona en Comú, which maintains that the expansion will bring an additional 1,800 people per day and, therefore, a careful study of its impact on traffic in the area is necessary. They also criticize Zara for not providing a loading and unloading zone at the building and for occupying public street space.