The Ciutadella, essentially scientific

Bad luck pursued the greenhouse of the Parc de la Ciutadella in Barcelona in its early days. The City Council announced a competition to urbanize the grounds of the military citadel, built in the 18th century by order of Philip V, in a large part of the Ribera neighborhood. The jury declared it void. They did not find any good ones. In a second call, with modified rules, the winner was Josep Fontserè.

The greenhouse that Fontserè proposed fit perfectly with the motto of his project "Gardens are to the city what lungs are to the human body" and was built according to his plans. But a strong storm – with hail included – left it so damaged that it was decided to tear it down and build a completely new one. The second invernacle was no longer designed by Fontserè, but by Josep Amargós, author of the Torre de les Aigües del Tibidabo and the Aigües de Barcelona pumping station in Cornellà de Llobregat.

Here is a new setback: it was planned to be completed for the celebration of the 1888 Universal Exposition – founded on the idea that "technology will change the world" – to showcase exotic and tropical plants. But the exhibition began... and it was not yet finished.

"These plants are quite happy", tells me the biologist Carles Lalueza-Fox, when we are inside the greenhouse. I see a great variety of greens. There is little flora and a lot of leaf. "The plants in this greenhouse lack a scientific narrative. We are designing it. We will have to explain why they are adapted to certain conditions and what is the evolutionary significance of their botanical characteristics", reflects Carles Lalueza. "Do we need a greenhouse, today, with this heat?", I ask myself out loud. "With climate change, perhaps it should have other characteristics", he tells me.

Over the years the greenhouse has not only hosted vegetation. Exhibitions, concerts have been held there... It has also been the seat of a restaurant and, even, there have been chickens, roosters, ducks and rabbits. And the deadly mushroom Amanita phalloides. It has had good moments – even heating – and others of lethargy.

A girl with long braided black hair, who is part of a very large family, is disagree from his group and approaches us discreetly. He seems to want to listen to Carles. "In the greenhouse people come, we don't have to go looking for them, unlike museums," says my host.

I read the greenhouse's schedule on a poster. Closing time is dusk. It's a different time each day, though a bit imprecise. But it's more precise than what a bar in Calaf, which I frequent, says: "We open when we arrive, we close when we leave, and if you come and we're not here, it's because we don't coincide".

Next, we head to the Martorell Museum –currently called the Martorell Exhibition Centre– which is right next door. We are accompanied by the soundtrack of a great chirping of birds flying around the pine trees. What a lot of nature within Barcelona! Carles has known this museum since childhood, belonging to a great naturalist, archaeologist, and merchant (and benefactor, as upon his death he left his legacy to the city). "I used to come with my father almost every Sunday. He would buy me minerals and fossils at a small counter at the entrance for my collection, which I still keep," he tells me.

"One should never underestimate the influence that a museum, or even an exhibition, can have on a person, decades later." In his case, it is quite evident: he is now the director of the Barcelona Natural Science Museum. And he adds: "Of many of the things we do today in scientific culture, we will see their impact in one or two generations. In reality, we work with the future, not with the past".

The Martorell Museum hosts major science outreach exhibitions. The temporary –long-term– exhibition now on is "The Invention of Time", full of reflections and curiosities. Like this one: among the champion longevity species, some jellyfish should be highlighted, which are essentially immortal. The price of this immortality is high: their mental life is extremely simple.

The complex of science-dedicated centres in the Ciutadella –Barcelona's oldest urban park– comprises two spaces that are currently under construction, also built for the 1888 Exhibition. These are the Castle of the Three Dragons (which was a cafeteria-restaurant at that international event, and for many years was the seat of the Zoology Museum) and the Umbracle (as the name suggests, for plants that need shade, which was innovative in the 19th century). New spaces will be added, such as the research centres being built in the old Fish Market and the state public library, on land next to the Estació de França. There is also the Zoo, which should be redefined as a conservation centre for endangered fauna.

The first building constructed as a public museum in Catalonia"The Martorell Museum is the first building constructed as a public museum in Catalonia. It was inaugurated in 1882. It was converted into the Museum of Geology in 1924," Carles Lalueza explains to me. The building is imposing, massive, and with few openings (which is why there is little natural light inside). When it was built, the importance of the museum was excessively measured by the building.