The team formed by BAAS architecture and h3o architects has won the competition convened by BIMSA for the rehabilitation of the Antic Hospital de la Santa Creu de Barcelona complex. The project includes the rehabilitation and expansion of the spaces of the Biblioteca de Catalunya and the future District Library, as well as the rehabilitation of the theater, the chapel, the Icub offices, and various common spaces. The approximate budget for the work is 29.6 million euros.

The honorary presidency of the UIA World Congress of Architects has fallen to a dean of urbanism, Joan Busquets (El Prat de Llobregat, 1946). Busquets directed the Planning Department of Barcelona City Council between 1983 and 1989 and during the preparations for the Olympic Games, has worked in cities across Europe and was a professor at Harvard University. "A congress like this must open the eyes of the youngest ones," he states.

"The planet does not negotiate. Climate collapse, war, displacement, and a technological acceleration that outpaces the profession are not topics for a congress. They are the conditions within which architecture works today": thus begins the Barcelona Declaration of the UIA Architects Congress, which concludes this Thursday at the Palau de Congressos de Barcelona (CCIB). "Every formal decision leaves a measurable trace. A material is already a carbon figure. A housing typology is already a statistic of who will survive the next heatwave. A footprint is already territory taken, or left, from another species," says the text read by the president of the Superior Council of Colleges of Architects of Spain, Marta Vall-llosera.

The thirty or so Catalan firms participating in the UIA architects' congress, most as speakers, others as moderators, reveal the character of the new generations: rooted and at the same time with international ambition. Many of these architects entered the market in the midst of a crisis and had to diversify to get by. And all are more aware than ever of the sector's great social and environmental challenges. "The selection of firms is not a matter of people, but of contexts. There are certain practices that are at a professional moment of introducing new parameters that have marked a turning point," states Pau Bajet, the congress's curator along with Maria Giramé, Carmen Torres, Pau Sarquella, Tomeu Ramis, and Mariona Benedito. "While forty years ago we spoke of the autonomy of architecture and its undeniable capacity to transform spaces and the city, the practices represented at the congress, both Catalan and international, make us realize that there is a great diversity of phenomena and disciplines that interact with space." Previous generations, those of the architects who built Olympic Barcelona, are also represented at the congress, but on routes organized by the congress itself. "There is no tabula rasa, but rather the younger ones collect, with more or less significant transformations, built, geological, cultural legacies...", says Bajet.

In the architectural treatise par excellence, The Ten Books on Architecture, the Roman architect and theorist Marcus Vitruvius proposed that architecture must fulfill three values, "firmitas, utilitas, venustas", that is, buildings must be solid enough, functional, and beautiful. But 2,000 years later, these values are insufficient to face the challenges of today's world, the ravages of the anthropocene. "Now perhaps we need other words, other ways of thinking: perhaps it is not about firmness but about instability: the ability to work with changing soils, rising seas, transforming climates, and uncertain futures," said architect Eva Franch on Monday at the first plenary session of the World Congress of Architects 2026, held in Barcelona.

The central nave of the Sagrada Família hosted on Saturday evening the conference Architectural dialogue between heritage and contemporaneity, a meeting that brought together some of the most relevant names in contemporary architecture within the framework of Barcelona's designation as World Capital of Architecture.  The event was attended by RCR Arquitectes, Carme Pigem, Ramon Vilalta and Rafael Aranda, winners of the Pritzker Prize in 2017, and by the Japanese architect Kazuyo Sejima, Pritzker Prize winner in 2010. The different interventions offered a shared reflection on the relationship between Antoni Gaudí's architecture and contemporaneity, the cultural value of architecture and its capacity to respond to the challenges of today's society.The day began with the presentation and welcome from Joan Trias de Bes, a doctor architect and member of the Sagrada Família board, and with an introduction by the basilica's director architect, Jordi Faulí, who gave a brief explanation of the nave and the Nativity façade.

From the very first moment, research on collective housing has been the central axis of the work of architect Marta Peris (Palma, 1972), the founder of the studio Peris+Toral together with her husband, José Manuel Toral. Currently, they are one of the most cutting-edge and awarded studios: among the accolades received by their block of 85 social housing units made of wood in Cornellà, known as Modulus Matrix, are the RIBA International Award and the awards from the Spanish Colleges of Architects. This Monday they will be at the UIA international congress to talk about domestic space as a "social project". "The congress will be a platform that will facilitate exchange, transversality, looking at each other and sharing things. Since what interests us is housing, it will be another scenario to highlight the work done here. Since we have it close by, it seems normal to us, but when you travel the world you realize it is extraordinary. The social housing built in Catalonia and the Balearic Islands is observed from all over the world," states Marta Peris. "And, above all, it will be a place for exchange with models like the Swiss one or that of the city of Vienna, where there is a very powerful social model," she emphasizes.

The 1996 congress of the International Union of Architects (UIA) in Barcelona left the memorable image of Plaça dels Àngels transformed into a grand stage to welcome a string of star architects including Jacques Herzog, Norman Foster, Peter Eisenman (who wore a Barça jersey) and Daniel Liebeskind. Thirty years later, this Sunday Barcelona will become the first city to host the congress twice. In these three decades, the sector has changed profoundly: at the time, the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, an emblem of iconic architecture, was still a year away from its inauguration; today, architects are fully involved in the great social and environmental challenges.

Without pleasure there is no revolution. And pleasure must be for everyone: architects Anna Puigjaner and Pol Esteve Castelló and the Care group present a pioneering inclusive dance hall within the macro-exhibition that can be seen at the Tres Xemeneies for the World Architecture Congress being held in Barcelona from June 28 to July 2. In this space, no one should be left on the margins; instead, the installations are conceived as a "ceiling," as Puigjaner says, with straps for support – also for making love, if applicable – armchairs, light lines to avoid disorientation, and hoses for drinking water. There is also a metallic cylinder that vibrates to the rhythm of the music so that deaf people can follow it.

Rafael Aranda, Carme Pigem and Ramon Vilalta have their most demanding project in hand, the expansion and renovation of Sants station, at the most intense moment of their careers, with projects in different phases in Dubai, China, Mexico, France, Albania, Portugal and Taiwan, among others. “Sants is a project of great complexity, we have never had one of this magnitude on the table,” states Vilalta. “We are working on a highly complex infrastructure, which does not stop during construction, and this makes the work very difficult,” he points out. Furthermore, in parallel to the initial phases of their project – which now focuses on the recovery of the environment, especially the emblematic Plaça dels Països Catalans, and the new high-speed and commuter train halls – Adif is carrying out about thirty small facility improvement projects. The first significant change that will be seen will occur around the station, which was previously like a roundabout around the Plaça dels Països Catalans. In the future, traffic will be limited to the sea side, next to the Parc de l'Espanya Industrial. Likewise, the RCR project for the Plaça dels Països Catalans, an award-winning work by Helio Piñón and Albert Viaplana, is based on the conclusions of a citizen participation process and on "restoring the original project" of the square and expanding it to double the current space, with a kind of passepartout that includes various points of vegetation. The works on the square are scheduled to be completed between the end of the year and the beginning of 2027, while the expansion of the lobbies will continue until February 2028. To make the station more open to the city, Sants will also have an access on the mountain side and an access on the sea side. Both will open during the last quarter of this year. "The station had become small, but, moreover, the expansion is necessary due to the liberalization of operators. Now trains pass through Sants much more frequently," points out the architect of the firm responsible for the project, Noèlia Baldayo.

More than ever, architecture is now Barcelona's most recognizable emblem nationally and internationally; from Barcelona World Capital of Architecture and the World Architecture Congress to the placement of the cross on the Jesus Christ tower of the Sagrada Família. It is also a time of major projects, including the transformation of the Tres Xemeneies building in Sant Adrià de Besòs into Catalunya Media City. For this reason, this concrete giant hosted a dinner a few days ago with about thirty guests organized by Turisme de Barcelona, with some of the most prominent Catalan architects and national and international journalists from generalist media and others specialized in architecture, including ARA. Among the international journalists were editors from The Times, The Guardian, Le Monde, Art Newspaper, Monocle, Giornale dell'Architettura, and Wallpaper. The dinner was part of a three-day program that also took them to places like the Casa de l'Arquitectura, at the old headquarters of the Gustavo Gili publishing house; to the exhibition Seny i rauxa at Dhub; to the Casacuberta Marsans collection; to the expansion works of Fira de Barcelona, and to the Mies van der Rohe award exhibition. Another of the notable activities was being able to observe the renovation of La Rambla from the viewpoint of the Columbus Monument. Among the institutional guests were representatives from Barcelona Regional and from the companies Roca and Santa & Cole. "We work to bring good tourists to Barcelona, and we don't just think about the city of Barcelona, but about the metropolitan area," said the general director of Turisme de Barcelona, Mateu Hernández.

One of the first projects for the facade of El Corte Inglés on Plaça Catalunya in Barcelona is at the antipodes of the final result: in the center there is a tower lit from within and the entire facade is dotted with triangular windows, like the department store's logo. This project by Elías Torres and José Antonio Martínez Lapeña, who a few years earlier had inaugurated the functional Hospital de Móra d'Ebre, brings to mind the audacity and lyricism of some of Josep Maria Jujol's works. But then, the client planed it down until they reached the austere and restrained project that was actually built. In fact, the same thing had happened to Josep Maria Jujol with Casa Planells on Diagonal, which was supposed to be a decorative explosion and ended up being an almost rationalist building. In both cases, common sense prevailed over impulse.

On the Parisian Île Seguin, cars gave way to culture. Renault built its last cars on this island in the Seine in 1992. The factory was demolished twenty years ago, and since then the island has become a new urban center for Paris with culture as its protagonist. One of the first major works carried out there was an auditorium by the Japanese architect Shigeru Ban, and this evening it was announced that the art center designed by the RCR studio, called Le Large, will open its doors on October 17. Furthermore, the art center is part of a cultural macrocomplex also designed by Rafael Aranda, Carme Pigem, and Ramon Vilalta, which includes one of the largest cinemas in Paris, with 8 rooms, one of which is IMAX, and over 16,000 m² of offices and spaces for companies and cultural industries.

The UIA 2026 Barcelona World Architecture Congress will become, between June 28 and July 2, the global epicenter of architectural debate. The congress, titled Becoming. Architectures for a planet in transition, will bring together around 10,000 participants and 250 speakers in more than 100 sessions. Here are 10 emblematic works by some of its most anticipated architects and speakers.

The architectural transformation of Olot's old town is unstoppable. "There had been so many plans that the residents were tired and wanted action," says architect Eduard Callís, the founder with Guillem Moliner of the studio Un Parell d'Arquitectes. This studio is responsible for a major recent project, the Pla de places i placetes of Olot. This Saturday, Callís guided the public through these works during a visit organized by the Group of Architects for the Defense and Intervention in Architectural Heritage (AADIPA) of the College of Architects of Catalonia. The most recent of these works are the Jardins de la Muralla, the result of injecting life into "a kind of empty space" that emerged from the demolition of a residential building about twenty years ago. "There were only two rows of plane trees and a esplanade, and the residents were very interested in transforming the place into a garden, and in this garden connecting the city with the river," says the architect. The inauguration is scheduled for May 8.

The Harquitectes studio It is experiencing a splendid moment, with six major public projects underway, two of which are the expansions of the MACBA and the MNAC. A few days after to present the MNAC project Harquitectes received the ARA award at the new headquarters of Prodis, the Terrassa-based foundation dedicated to the comprehensive care and support of adults with intellectual disabilities, mental disorders, cerebral palsy, or autism spectrum disorder. For this project, the result of the rehabilitation of former industrial buildings that were part of Vapor Cortès, Harquitectes are finalists for the Mies van der Rohe Award for European Architecture. "The award certainly excites us, especially when I see how excited the people at Prodis are, who have undergone a great transformation with this building," says Roger Tudó, one of the studio's founders, along with Xavier Ros, David Lorente, and Josep Ricart, who is not participating in this interview.

"A cemetery is not a tomb... it's not that relationship with the landscape and with oblivion... It seems as if the deaths of all of us leave us immobile..." wrote architects Enric Miralles and Carme Pinós when they designed the new cemetery in Igualada, one of the most important works of its time, both nationally and internationally. "In the landscape, this path is a cloud of trees that echoes the existing profile... you walk beneath these trees, and the burials are in the walls of this cut," they also said. Sunday was a dreary day, and the low clouds accentuated the fact that the cemetery, which was left unfinished in the mid-nineties, is buried in an old streambed. Furthermore, over the years, the concrete has aged, and the unfinished chapel has a monumental character and, at the same time, a somewhat unsettling quality. "Descending, beneath the trees, leaving the cut towards the river: something like a promenade, and some existing trees have led you somewhere else," Miralles and Pinós said.

The first major milestone of Barcelona, ​​the World Capital of Architecture, is here. Mayor Jaume Collboni and lead architect Maria Buhigas have unveiled the scale model. Barcelona Plan 2026-2035, A cutting-edge miniature model of the city will be on permanent display at the former headquarters of Editorial Gustavo Gili, which serves as the headquarters for the European Capital of Culture. "We want to pay tribute to architecture and urban planning as powerful tools for improving people's lives and expressing values, a vision of the city," says Jaume Collboni, who was also accompanied by Pere Navarro, delegate of the Zona Franca Consortium. The model, built to a scale of 1:1,500, covers the central part of the Barcelona metropolitan area, known as the Pla de Barcelona, ​​bordered by the Collserola mountain range to the north, the lower course of the Besòs River to the east, the Llobregat River and its delta to the west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the south.

Architect Josep Lluís Mateo (Barcelona, ​​1949) achieved one of the first major international milestones in the mid-1990s with a new headquarters for the German central bank in Chemnitz. The competition was a challenge, and Mateo prevailed with a truly ambitious project. After discovering the fossilized trees in the city's Paleontology Museum, Mateo conceived the building, located in the Park of the Victims of Fascism—home to a centuries-old forest—as "a petrified tree," as can be seen in the exhibition Mateo presented at the College of Architects of Catalonia's historical archive. The tree metaphor allowed Mateo to resolve the building's relationship with its surroundings and also with Germany's turbulent history. The most striking detail is that the main façade is made of alabaster, which freezes in cold weather, and glass. This allows natural light to enter, and at night it transforms the building into an urban lantern. "The building is, at the same time, something organic and geometric," says Mateo. The exhibition is titled Open work The curators are Maria Figueras and Cristina Marcos, from the Acto studio, along with Mateo's own studio. As for the title, it refers to how Mateo approaches his work "as an open work, to be discovered in each case," as he himself says.

While this weekend the Luz BCN Festival gives the popular starting signal to the Barcelona World Capital of ArchitectureThe official launch will take place on February 12, coinciding with Saint Eulalia's Day. The program for the European Capital of Culture, which will conclude on December 13, coinciding with Saint Lucy's Day, will include more than 1,500 activities, 500 of which are routes and guided tours. There will also be 300 debates and conferences, 143 exhibitions, and 140 workshops. These are some of the must-sees.