On a basic level, it seems silly to rank pizza. Everybody has their own tastes and regional biases. Nevertheless, battling over pizza has prompted brawls, splintered families and, I’m sure, sparked a war, at some point. (Eagerly looking forward to a “Rest is History” segment on “The Great Pizza Wars of 1564.”)

Nobody would say Barcelona is a great pizza city. There are great Italian restaurants and you can find pizza everywhere, but that doesn’t necessarily make it a great pizza city. It’s simply not a specialty in a city that focuses on its own regional cuisines. (Feel free to debate.)

All that said, one restaurant consistently gets singled out for the best pizza in Barcelona, as well as one of the best in the world. Among people who spend time rating pizza, this one is always on the list.

Sartoria Panatieri specializes in a “farm-to-pizza” approach, and they take it very seriously. Ingredients are locally-sourced, sausages are produced with “organically raised Gascon pork” and dough is made of local organic flour. The style is religiously Neapolitan, which features a soft, flexible crust, which may not be to everyone’s tastes. (Going back to pizza bias, it’s worth noting that the rare negative reviews of Sartoria Panatieri often cite the squishy, notably non-crispy crust, when, in fact, the soft crust is a defining element of a Neapolitan-style pizza.)

This is not a place to order a slice of pepperoni and mushroom. Their best-known creation features Stracciatella (a form of shredded mozzarella curd), tomato, basil pesto, and pine nuts. Or you might try the roasted leek with hazelnut butter and hazelnuts. Or the Diavola with spicy chorizo.

In 2026, an organization called 50 Top Pizza World, which appears to spend a lot of time thinking about pizza ranked Sartoria Panatieri as the 29^th best in the world, and 5^th in Europe. That was a bit of a come down — in 2023, they named Sartoria Panatieri the best in Europe. (Full Disclosure: I know nothing about 50 Top Pizza World, which could be some sort of viral scam perpetuated by Big Pizza. But Sartoria Panatieri’s inclusion certainly gives it some credibility.)

“Despite their success, their attitude remains that of never settling: it can be seen in the meticulous care of the menu, built from authentic products, where nature, with the rhythm of the seasons, decides what goes on the menu. Based on this philosophy, they have created a true community, choosing local artisans and tracing a direct path from production to plate.” -50 Top Pizza World jury

For a slightly less pizza pretentious perspective, I enjoyed this review from Jamie, a travel blogger.

There are two locations, in Gràcia and Eixample, and each has its own personality and menu. The Gràcia restaurant, the original, has a small neighborhood atmosphere, and the menu features “classic flavors” and seasonal pizzas; the Eixample edition is more minimalist and industrial and, the site explains, “thanks to the spaciousness of the kitchen, we discover new flavors and textures, also taking advantage of the ingredients that each season offers us.”

Gràcia location:

Map for Gracia location

Eixample location:

Map for Eixample location

Sartoria Panatieri Web Site

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Barcelona marked a major milestone in the saga of the perennially unfinished Sagrada Familia in June, when Antoni Gaudí’s grand achievement was officially ordained as “the world’s tallest church.” The celestial-terrestrial mashup festival featured a visit by the Pope, a citywide Gaudí fiesta and a massive multimedia drone fireworks and light show that became a viral hit.

Amid the hoopla, there was the underlying vibe that we were all celebrating the completion of Sagrada Familia, the world’s longest on-going construction project. All the spires were topped off with glowing crosses; every bit of symbolic ornamentation had been carved into the façade. Gaudí’s vision had burst into life with the Pope’s blessing and a 3D can-you-top-this, bombs-bursting-in-air extravaganza. (And I’m guessing the notoriously humble Gaudí would have hated it.)

Everything about the ceremony suggested this was Sagrada Familia’s grand ribbon cutting, the final dramatic end of the Sagrada construction story. People could rejoice that through artistry, perseverance and incredible sums of money, the great church was actually done. Headlines proclaimed that Gaudí’s epic church was finally finished. (Sample from Forbes: “Barcelona’s Sagrada Familia, Completed After 144 Years…”).

Except everyone in Barcelona knows it’s not. Not even close.

During June’s hoopla, lead architect Mauricio Cortés moved to deflate the “Sagrada is finished” narrative.

“I’ve read a few headlines that said that, this year, the Sagrada Familia will be completed,” Cortés told Dezeen. “However, the case is that the central towers will be completed with the Jesus tower, but then there are future challenges ahead.”

At the top of the “future challenges” to-do list is completion of the Glory Facade and a “Grand Staircase,” a 60-meter platform that would extend across an existing street, Carrer de Mallorca. The staircase would connect the raised Sagrada entrance to the street level, but would require the absorption and destruction of several existing residential and retail buildings. Estimates suggest current plans would displace about 200 to 300 families.

Now that the main work on the basilica is finished, the La Sagrada Família Foundation, the private non-profit group that controls the church’s construction, has made it clear it intends to push forward with the plan for the Grand Staircase, which has been a source of dispute and controversy for decades. Organized, passionate neighborhood opposition groups are in place to oppose the church’s expansion plans, and they have a strong case.

Beyond the unfairness of tearing down homes and businesses, they argue the evidence is hazy that Gaudí was even that interested in the staircase. The platform and stairs appear in his early models, but many elements changed over the years.

“These stairs are not Gaudí’s and they were designed later by his disciples to have an excuse to ask for donations,” Salvador Barroso, president of People Affected by the Construction of the Sagrada Família, a neighborhood group told Catalan News in 2021.

But the church foundation counters that the staircase is essential to achieve Gaudí’s ultimate vision. Few of his drawings or models survived a Civil War-era anarchist attack, but the church says the staircase was always part of the plan. They point to one the original models of the church, subsequent drawings and a 1916 permit application which clearly include the staircase.

Supporters argue that Gaudí specifically designed the church four feet above the road with the intent that the staircase would connect the basilica to the street level. Taking it a symbolic step further — because there is always a symbolic step further with Sagrada — the underside of the staircase is meant to symbolize hell and the area above the stairs the ascension to heaven, church officials say. Plans call for many, many symbolic elements in the Glory Facade package, including very symbolic depictions of the Seven Deadly Sins and the Seven Heavenly Virtues.

In Barcelona, everyone knows this has been coming. The grand staircase and its potential impact on the surrounding land already have been the subject of lawsuits and controversy. Several of the affected buildings were built in the 1960s and ‘70s, when the notoriously corrupt pro-Franco regime ignored the church’s plans and turned over the land to private developers. The city and courts backed the developers’ argument that the church couldn’t prove the staircase was part of Gaudí’s vision.

At the time, nobody thought the church would ever be finished, so it didn’t really matter. Many of the buyers who bought homes in the residential buildings constructed reportedly were warned about the potential for the church to expand, but moved forward anyway, according to news reports.

But now the miracle has happened. The main portion of the basilica is completed and the church foundation is ready to move forward with its plan.

The dispute will spotlight Barcelona’s traditional rivals — the church and the socialist party, which currently dominates local government. And, as always in Barcelona, it’s complicated. The process will unfold against a backdrop of years of poorly executed gentrification throughout the city, which has destroyed old neighborhoods and contributed to soaring home prices.

The current city council, which typically tries to promote the rights of working-class residents, has vowed that no plan will be approved until all the existing residents are guaranteed homes. But that’s always a tricky process, especially for elderly families that have lived in their home for years. (Some owners have expressed a willingness to sell and move, according to news reports.) At the same time, city planners see an opportunity to improve traffic flow and the pedestrian experience around Sagrada, one of the world’s biggest tourist attractions.

By some estimates, the staircase and its associated elements could take 10 years to plan and build, at least. Given the circumstances and realities of Barcelona, let’s assume that Sagrada is nowhere close to be finished.

More from Barcelona Anarchy…

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Spain is a cornucopia of wild festivals, celebrating everything from raging bulls to squishy tomatoes. Barcelona alone trots out a steady stream of traditional fiestas, which provide a great excuse for reckless merriment and blowing up shit.

That said, one festival stands out on the calendar, the annual event regarded as “the big one.” If you’re jonesing for that big festival Spain experience, this is the one you don’t want to miss.

Known simply as La Mercè, the annual festival at the end of September brings together all the elements of traditional Catalan festivals into a five-day marathon of continuous performances, events and general mayhem.

La Mercè covers all the bases. If you’re looking for a Burning Man, lets-do-mushrooms-and-dance-in-the-streets kind of vibe, you’ll find it. if you want a more cultural, folksy experience, reflecting local communities and old Catalan traditions, you’ll find that, too.

On a simple level, the festival marks the end of the summer, the bookend to the Sant Joan Festival in June, which hails the beginning of summer with bonfires in the streets and gratuitous amounts of explosions. (Catalan festivals always display a real zeal for explosions. Even the craziest, batshit fireworks lover in Waco, Texas, confronted with a Barcelona festival, would take a step back and say, “whoa, you guys really need to take it down a notch.”)

The origins of La Mercè can be traced to a plague of locusts, which is very on brand for Barcelona. Many of the city’s most storied traditions, heroes and myths stem from some sort of tragedy or noble cause that went horribly wrong. In the case of La Mercè, in 1687 city leaders prayed to Our Lady of Mercy for relief from the swarming locusts, which were devastating crops and wreaking havoc, in general.

When their prayers were answered and the locusts miraculously disappeared, the city repaid Our Lady of Mercy by naming her Barcelona’s patron saint, a move blessed 200 years later by the Pope. (The legend of the Virgin Saint of Barcelona goes back to 1218, when three people saw a vision of the Virgin Mary urging them to found an order to save another Christian sect and… it’s complicated.)

“Fiestas do not seem to me to be celebrations of the past. Some are genuinely spiritual, religious affairs. Others are expressions of local pride or chauvinism. Most, however, are about fun.” -Giles Tremlett, author of “Ghosts of Spain.”

The modern La Mercè festival flows into every community in the city, although most of the big events are centered around the Gothic Quarter. Every day features a full calendar of dancers, musicians, gigante parades and cultural events spread around the neighborhoods. The festival may be staged on a grand corporate scale these days, but there is still a low-key, community vibe to many of the annual festivities. Clubs, community groups and families spend months preparing for the festival, just as their families before them. Children walk in the parades with their parents, who walked with their parents. Drunken frat boys follow the paths of drunken frat boys of yore.

The festivities conclude with a massive “piromusical,” a grand display of synchronized fireworks music that rivals New Year’s Eve for explosions on a grand scale. I highly recommend skipping the crowds and noise of the piromusical.

For most fans, the festival really focuses on three must-do events, quintessential elements of the Barcelona festival experience.

Follow the Beat

Opening night is highlighted by the parade of drum corps that pound through the streets of the old district, usually starting in El Born. A conga line forms behind the drummers and dancers and giant figurines of dragons and beasts. You can’t help but fall into line and join the procession, pounding along with the drummers.

Throughout the festival, these drum groups randomly pop up in the district and start a march.

They represent their communities; people from all walks of life who have found their common rhythmic obsession. Together, they are finely-tuned instruments and competitive-good, ready to show off and start the party with a drum march. Their pounding beats create a great throbbing, interactive flow to the events. It’s a wonderful, communal experience.

Behold the Human Pyramids

If you spend any time thinking about it, castellers are really one of the wackier regional customs. Forming massive human pyramids and then urging little children to scamper to the top doesn’t seem like healthiest of cultural traditions. (“Don’t worry, the six-year-old is wearing a helmet!”) Nevertheless, castellers are a deeply rooted institution in villages and towns throughout Catalonia.

You can run into castellers at festivals around the region throughout the year, but La Merce is one of the premier events. Teams come from all over to show off their skills in front of the crowds in Plaça de Sant Jaume. Towers will reach nine-stories, frail examples of teamwork, strength and communal psychosis.

It is one of those postcard images: people jammed into the square, jostling for the best view, as the castellers build their human towers above the crowd, going higher and higher. It’s wild, exhilarating and a bit crazy, exactly the type of gathering that makes La Mercè special.

The Fire Parade

The nominal highlight of each’s festival is the correfoc, the fire parade, which is kind of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade for devil worshippers. Instead of floats and a Snoopy balloon bobbing overhead, the correfoc is a wild, bacchanalian orgy of fire, noise and strange symbolism that moves through the street spewing sparks and explosions.

There are many old stories behind the origin of this particular ritual. The fire parade can trace its roots back to the “Ball de Diables” (”Dance of Devils”) in the 12th Century. Nobody cares. Today, the annual La Mercè correfoc is an exuberant, fire-filled party. Sure, it seems mainly for buzzed university students and tourists, but that also doesn’t matter, once you’re part of it.

Boundaries blur as the crowd intertwines with the parade. Fire devils aggressively spray sparks at people standing too close. If they think you want a good photo, they will attack, firing sparks at you, the perfect photo op that may or may not set your hair on fire.

If you’re not a big fan of noise, explosions and the potential for third-degree burns, you really don’t want a front row seat to the correfoc. On the other hand, screw it. Wear long sleeves and a hat. Embrace the legends of the devils. Get in there and dance with fire.

You can find more information about this year’s La Mercè here. (One annoying Barcelona habit: they don’t release the full program until days before the start of the festival.)

Each year the festival chooses the work of a local artist for the La Mercè poster. Here is more info on this year’s winner.

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But we’ll occasionally share hotels we like.

Motel One Barcelona-Ciutadella offers an easy, no hassle option. In many ways, it’s a typical mid-range Euro hotel (prices are generally in the €150-€200 range), with Euro-small rooms, which means you probably won’t want to spend more than a few nights. It’s no frills — no balconies or pool. But Motel One executes well, with a friendly lobby and bar, with hanging swinging chairs… and who doesn’t like a bar with hanging chairs? The staff is friendly, everything is clean and there is a rooftop terrace with spectacular views.

The best part about the Motel One is that it is close to everything, but not actually in the heart of the tourist area. You are across the street from the spectacular Parc de Ciutadella (and you may awaken to the sounds of a local festival), but you’re far enough away from the entrance not to be bothered by the crowds. Best of all, you are a short walk to El Born, one of the best places to eat and hang out in the city. You definitely don’t want to stay in El Born, but staying El Born adjacent is a big plus.

In general, this part of the city, typically referenced by the Arc de Triomf, is an underrated base of operations. If you’re ready to get away from the tourists, there is nothing better than a stroll up Passeig de St. Joan, one of the city’s great boulevards. It’s a part of the city that most tourists don’t see.

Tip: Motel One will definitely hit you with a hefty parking fee.

Motel One Web Site

Motel One Map

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Instead, over the years Cerdà’s ideas were trashed, as Glòries was turned into a concrete mess of decaying neighborhoods and highway flyovers. It was best known for the crusty Encants flea market, which flowed through the streets, and the condom-shaped Torre Glòries (also known as Torre Agbar), the Jean Nouvel-designed tower that sticks out like a sore thumb from the skyline, unconnected to the city.

It took two decades, but the city has finally completed a plan to redesign Glòries around mobility and green space, creating a model for urban regeneration. It may not look anything like Cerda’s original concept, but the city has delivered on a promise to make Glòries a better place to live and work.

The new park officially opened last year and it’s amazing to see the transformation. For anybody who knew the old Glòries, stepping out of the metro station into the new district is a shock. The gray, depressing vibe is gone. There are cultural centers and green spaces that look like an organic part of the city, as if they’ve always been there.

The Glòries plan is playing a big role in this year’s World Architecture of Congress, which is celebrating the city’s commitment to architecture and urban renewal. (You can take a free tour.) There are lessons to be learned from the process and the years of aggravation that led to the final design.

There were many seemingly insurmountable obstacles to overcome, including dozens of conflicting interests, massive bureaucracies and longstanding distrust of any city plan. Redevelopment in the city traditionally meant massive displacement of locals, gentrification and gifts for the wealthy developers.

Is Spain a good place to retire? Isidra Marcos interviewed me about the challenges.

The area targeted for redevelopment was primarily private land. A large complicated public-private apparatus was developed that focused on the big ideas of urban regeneration, taking a big swing at equity, affordability and healthy living. The city took an active lead role to develop the plan and back funding, an essential ingredient. A public entity, the Consorci de la Zona Franca de Barcelona (CZFB), comprised of federal and business interests, helped facilitate development and funding, while the city subsidized affordable housing with private developers.

The first step was the development of 22@, a new technological district. But it’s interesting to note that the innovation district alone was not a catalyst for major change — a 2000-era study found only 5% of the workers in the 22@ district actually lived in the area.

The centerpiece of the redevelopment is Parc de les Glòries, a nine-hectare (22 acre) park with 30,000 square meters of green space and more than 1,000 trees. In a city not known for green space, it is now the second largest park in the city, behind Parc de la Cuitadella.

The park is designed with spaces for families and events. It’s more than a “stretch of lawn.”

The redevelopment also created a new cultural hub for the city, including the Teatre Nacional de Catalunya, spotlighting Catalonia’s performing arts; L’Auditori & Museu de la Música, focusing on musical arts; and a center devoted to design, the distinctive Disseny Hub Barcelona, which is next to the metro stop that serves the district.

During the years of redevelopment, the city also created a new central home for the flea market.

Walking around the area, you can see an attention to detail, and a willingness to push the boundaries for Barcelona design. You can also see the cooperation between different design disciplines, including landscape architecture. The metro stop features a sunken amphitheater with a cactus garden.

There is an easy test for any regeneration plan: do people use the spaces? On any given day, Glòries is alive with activity. The offices are occupied, the housing in demand. Locals have embraced the park, which is now the center of daily life for the neighborhood and a key mobility connection to the metro stop and surrounding communities.

Not everyone is happy with the final result — it’s Barcelona. Debates will continue over affordable housing, the long-term commitment to sustainability and a dozen other issues. But Glòries stands as an example of perseverance and a city’s commitment to focus on big issues and reverse the mistakes of the past.

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This year’s poster, created by Barcelona muralist and visual artist Cinta Vidal, is entitled, “Barcelona unfolded: a city of perspectives, routes and discoveries.” After controversies over previous posters, it was approved by “virtually unanimous approval from residents,” according to local residents.

In many ways, the result is a salute to Barcelona’s legacy of people-focused urbanism. The poster includes recognizable landmarks such as the cathedral, Plaça del Rei and Parc de la Ciutadella, but they are stacked on top of each other and all are pointing in different directions. People inhabit the abstract spaces. Oversized elements of Barcelona culture are embedded in the scenes, including espadrilles, an oil cruet and a baritone horn.

“Just like Barcelona, the poster cannot be understood from just a single perspective,” the city notes in its description.

The city’s site describes the poster as “an open scene full of possible routes which encourage viewers to participate.” Vidal’s work will live on as a permanent large-scale mural in the Francesc Candel Library.

“I wanted to depict a city that cannot be seen from just a single place but is discovered by walking it, a Barcelona made of diverse connections, encounters and perspectives which is transformed into a huge shared space during La Mercè,” Vidal says.

Barcelona does a great job of chronicling the creation of the poster and mural.

You can find past posters here:

Merce Posters

La Mercè is always at the end of September and starts this year on Sept. 23. One less endearing tradition: they never release the final program until days before the festival, apparently in an attempt to limit international tourists. You can find info as it becomes available here.

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When tourists talk about “the bullring” in Barcelona, they are typically referring to Las Arenas, the former bullring on the Placa Espanya traffic circle that was redesigned into a circular shopping mall in 2011 by Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners. It offers an eclectic mix of chain stores and an upper deck with a nice view of the traffic circle, but it doesn’t offer much of an authentic experience, unless you really like round shopping malls.

But Las Arenas was not the only bullring in Barcelona. There is another, much-less-traveled arena that still carries the ambiance and style of a real bullring and it hosts a museum celebrating the gruesome sport’s history in Barcelona. The arena is also a spectacular example of 1900s design and craftsmanship, constructed at the time when modernisme was sweeping through the city.

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Dear Subscribers,

What makes a city interesting, compelling, the type of place you want to explore and maybe sell your furniture and move to? It’s not an easy question. Great cities don’t happen by accident. Choices are made. Risks taken. In every city, heroes and villians emerge.

In a sense, Barcelona Anarchy is about answering those questions, at least for this specific place, which has been shaped by centuries of inspiration, scandal and questionable decisions.

In recent weeks, I’ve started to write more about the topics that I’ll be exploring in Barcelona Anarchy, while continuing to add news items and building out the tips section. In a couple of months, Barcelona Anarchy has zoomed past 100 subscribers, a nice start-up milestone. It’s been fun diving into the Substack community, which is engaged, interested and free of a lot of the hubris and bullshit found on other platforms.

As I continue to finish work on my Barcelona book, you’ll start seeing more about the themes, people and stories that have sucked me into Barcelona.

I’m selective in choosing topics for news articles. There are many great news feeds out there. But Barcelona news is often interesting to the rest of the world, in a what-the-hell? kind of way. In general, I’m focusing on news that impacts tourists and expats. The item on the Sagrada Familia LEGO set has been my most widely read story so far.

Meanwhile, I’ve started to hit critical mass in the travel tip section. I’ll soon put these behind the paywall (along with older articles). Adding tips will be an on-going process.

I promise not to bombard you with emails. Thank you for reading and your support!

Kevin

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In its latest move to address the impact of tourism on the city, the Barcelona City Council has decided to ban private bike-sharing programs, such as Lime, Bird, Bolt and Voi.

The Council says it will continue to expand the oft-criticized city-operated bike-sharing program, Bicing, which is only available for residents. But the private bike services are a “mess” that are doing more harm than good, Mayor Jaume Collboni said at a recent press conference.

Data shows that 90% of rentals on the “dockless” private programs are by tourists, the city says. And confused bike-renting tourists are apparently careening around the city, causing accidents and cluttering the sidewalks and parking areas with discarded bikes, city officials say.

In recent years more than 4,500 complaints have been filed about the bike programs and more than 5,400 fines issued, according to the city’s statistics. At its peak, more than 3,500 bikes were laying around the city, and more than 2,000 bikes have been impounded for parking in unauthorized areas.

The city says the bike services didn’t live up to agreements to police their own riders. They voted to eliminate the bike-sharing apps by Jan., 2027.

The bike programs are a “mess,” Mayor Collboni told reporters. “The city must protect public space.”

The news will likely prompt gratuitous eye-rolling in some circles, given Barcelona’s socialist-led government’s recent headline-grabbing efforts to curb the effects of the tourists flooding into the city. In the past year, the city announced plans to eliminate AirBnbs, raise tourist taxes and ban cruise ship stopovers.

Critics say the city’s decision to dump the private services will eliminate mobility options, at a time when biking-sharing is growing in popularity in many cities. The public Bicing bike-sharing network, with docking stations around the city, is popular and tidy, but it also plagued by glitches and maintenance issues. And it’s only for locals.

“This decision goes against the trend elsewhere in Europe and the world, where bike share systems are increasingly an integral part of sustainable urban mobility systems,” Henk Swarttouw, the president of the Brussels-based European Cyclists’ Federation, said in a social post.

But the Council has been consistent in its efforts to shift the city’s focus from tourism to residents. In recent years, the city has greatly expanded the local network of bike lanes and car-free roads, making cycling a safer and more reasonable experience. (Although the Bicing system is for locals only, tourists can still rent bikes from local shops, Barcelona authorities note.)

While eliminating the bike-sharing apps may seem anti-mobility, the dockless programs present specific issues. It’s similar to the rollout of scooter rentals, which swamped cities. Scooters rentals seemed like a good idea, right up until piles of abandoned scooters started showing up on street corners and emergency rooms filled up with drunken frat boys who, it turns out, can’t ride a scooter.

The same issues have plagued the rollout of the bike apps, and the numbers suggest they won’t be missed, at least by locals.

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If you want to learn more about Antoni Gaudí before he became a celebrity brand, it’s best to get away from his big tourist sites – Sagrada Familia, Parc Güell, and his contributions to Passeig de Gracia’s mansion scene, Casa Batlló and Casa Milà. You can find lessor known Gaudí creations throughout the city, and each illustrates different aspects of Gaudí’s life and work, before he became obsessed with Sagrada Familia.

One of his earliest and most influential works rarely gets the attention of the tour buses, but it’s steps off La Rambla, making it, if nothing else, the easiest accessible Gaudí site.

Palau Güell was Gaudí’s first major commission for Eusebi Güell, who become his most important patron. The regal mansion on the narrow street was built from 1886 to 1890 — Güell reportedly wanted to stay in the old city rather than join the mansion-building contest going on in the new Eixample district — as the young Gaudí was starting to attract serious buzz. He had finished his first residential commission, Casa Vicens, only a few years earlier.

Palau Güell features many elements that would become Gaudí signatures. Gaudí and Güell shared a zealous commitment to their religious beliefs, and the mansion is a mix of symbolism and practical innovations for designing a place to live in 1890.

The mansion, which was declared a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1984, Palau Güell features stunning glass and iron work, soaring parabolic arches, and the type of artistic flourishes that helped define Gaudí’s legacy. The centerpiece is a massive 17.5-meter-tall vestibule with gold leaf, sculpted oak ceilings and a tall pipe organ, celebrating the piety of the owner and the architect.

But Gaudí was also focused on supporting the Güell family’s daily lives, from the placement of the lanterns to the location of the livery stable below the living quarters. On the roof, mosaic chimneys — a design element that would pop up in his later work — allow air and light to stream into the spaces. Bedrooms and playrooms were brought to life with stained glass and sculpted designs, the flairs of a young architect using every detail to create wonderful environments. There are many religious spaces, but there’s also a billiards room.

Tip: In the summer, the Palau hosts special rooftop events, including an express tour, refreshments and a live concert performed by young musicians from the Raval’s Taller de Músics.

Extra tip: Admission is free on the first Sunday of the month, part of Barcelona’s free museum program.

Palau Guell Web Site

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It happens all the time. You’re looking for a nice restaurant. Nothing fancy. You don’t need a Michelin star. And you definitely don’t want a chain. You just want that comfy spot, with a little authenticity, some style and, you know, maybe good pizza.

It can be a challenge in Barcelona, especially if you’re not familiar with the neighborhoods. Prices are high and authenticity scarce.

Il Giardinetto di Gràcia is what you’re looking for. It’s located on a quiet side street in Gràcia, in a building dating to 1880, with a small garden in the back. It’s been run by the same family for 30 years, offering “traditional food with the best from the local market.”

For the record, Il Giardinetto de Gràcia is unrelated to Il Giardinetto, a fancy, award-winning Italian restaurant in Sarria-Sant-Gervasi. One of the best known upscale Italian restaurants in the city, Il Giardinetto was established in 1974 by the famous Catalan photographer Leopoldo Pomés. (Il Giardinetto is “little garden” in Italian.)

Even though the sign says “Pizzeria,” Il Giardinetto di Gràcia is really more Catalan than Italian. The menu offers traditional local favorites, such as pigs feet with beans and mushrooms (peus de porc a la catalana amb mongetes i moixernons) and bacallà amb samfaina o gratinat amb all i oli (cod with samfaina or gratin with garlic and oil). Chef specials spotlight regional offerings like grilled squid, Andalucian gazpacho and grilled artichokes.

If you’re not in the mood for the Catalan dishes, the menu also includes a variety of pasta dishes and pizza, all served with fresh ingredients and some style.

“All our dishes are prepared by hand with fresh, quality products,” the restaurant says on its web site.

Il Giardinetto di Gràcia makes good on that promise in a quaint neighborhood-restaurant environment, far removed from the tourist throngs.

Click here for Il Giardinetto di Gracia

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A thriving community of writers is chronicling life in Spain on Substack. They are sharing stories of history, culture and the horrors of finding an affordable rental, bringing their own perspectives to every tale.

The one universal topic is food, specifically the flavors, animal parts and traditions that make Spain’s culinary world fascinating and smelly. Every dish has a story behind it. Every recipe and ingredient tells us something about the region and the people.

Here is a sampling of recent articles from Substack writers, capturing some of the elements that make Spanish food special.

Easily the best story I’ve read recently about barnacles. It turns out there is a festival, the barnacles are really expensive and geese aren’t really involved.

“The goose barnacle is one of the ocean’s strangest-looking delicacies and one of the most expensive in the world. If you squint hard enough, the long, leathery neck and prehistoric-looking ‘claw’ looks a little like a barnacle goose - at least that’s what people thought when the birds turned up for the first time in Scotland in the 12^th century.”

Read "The Roncudo Goose Barnacle"

Margaret Gypsy takes us into the world of sardines, a staple of Spanish menus. You’ll also learn about garum , a “fermented fish sauce.”

“Size is not important here. What is important, is the freshness of the fish. A fresh sardine should be shiny and not floppy. When cooked, the meat is soft and flakey, with a sweet and rich flavor.”

Read "A Simple Sardine"

“Slushies” make me think of a convenience story sludge. That’s not this. Rachel Drummond shares the recipe for a simple, refreshing Spanish summer favorite that may or may not work for mojitos.

“Keeping with the citrus theme, this year we’re making citrus granizados, or lemon-lime slushies. Granizados get that we need copious amounts of ice to cool off and hydrate. They’re only available in some bars: look for the hand-drawn sign outside, or make your own at home.”

Read about "Citrus Granizado"

More from Galicia. Miguel Balsa Campos shares the background and recipes for the famous Galician octopus dishes, Pulpo Á Feira and Pulpo A La Gallega (I write about my favorite Galican octopus spot in Barcelona here.)

“Pulpo á feira literally means “fair-style octopus”, while pulpo a la gallega means “Galician-style octopus”. In practice, many people use the names almost interchangeably outside Galicia, but although they refer to the same dish, both names have different literal meanings. The dish consists of round slices of boiled octopus dressed with paprika, olive oil and salt. It’s pretty simple.”

Read “The Camino’s Most Iconic Dish”

What to Bring Home from a Spanish Supermarket (and What to Leave Behind)

You need help from a local. I can be that local.

You’re in a Spanish market and looking for a few items to take home. Blanca Valencia offers helpful information for excellent items to stuff in your suitcase that will live in your kitchen for months.

“My list includes extra virgin olive oil that smells of fresh tomato leaves and cut grass, tinned fish with labels that belong in a design museum, legumes and rice with a sense of place wrapped in sackcloth.”

Read "What to Bring Home From..."

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As big city cultural institutions go, it’s pretty easy to get into one of Barcelona’s cool museums for free.

To start, most museums open their doors on the first Sunday of every month. So that’s pretty good. Less widely discussed: many museums may let you in after 3 p.m. on any Sunday. And there are also of a slew of open days during festivals and events, in addition to the annual La Nit dels Museus, when the museums open until 1 a.m. the Saturday before International Museum Day, May 18.

And we’re talking pretty much every major museum in town, including:

• Picasso Museum

• MNAC (National Art Museum of Catalonia)

• Miró Museum

• Montjuïc Castle

• Botanical Garden

• Palau Güell

At the very least, it’s worth checking any museum’s site before you go. You might be surprised to find there is an opportunity for a free visit.

Of course, be aware, you won’t be the only one with this idea. Free days can be crowded, especially in the afternoons. Museu Picasso, for example, is typically overrun, and the narrow old city streets in the area get clogged, making it a great area to avoid on free museum days, unless you’re an early riser.

But if it’s a rainy Barcelona day and you have nothing better to do – and maybe you’re entertaining kids – you can’t beat a free museum.

Barcelona Tourism is a good place to start for information.

Barcelona Tourism Museum Info

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As UNESCO celebrates Barcelona as the 2026 World Capital of Architecture, highlighting the city’s success stories, organizers should take some time to discuss the misguided decisions and scandalous projects that continue to tarnish the city’s neighborhoods.

Throughout the city, random glass, steel and concrete edifices protrude from the famed modernist neighborhoods, unconnected to the community, style or common sense. The ideals that define the city were abandoned to approve projects that provide little value and, to this day, destroy the skyline.

These buildings didn’t happen by accident. Plans and regulations were ignored. Developers were given free rein. Leaders vacated their responsibilities.

It’s a familiar story in cities around the world. But it is particularly glaring in Barcelona, where the city’s core and identity are built around scale, nature and a commitment to healthy living.

Even in Eixample, the district of uniform blocks created by Ildefons Cerdà’s world famous urban plan, the neighborhoods are littered with shockingly inappropriate, utilitarian buildings. In many cases, they are jammed next to classic old buildings. Who would think this is a good idea?

These are the type of buildings that pop up when planners don’t care and city leaders turn over the keys to the developers. It happens in most cities and Barcelona, land o’ modernisme, didn’t escape the greed and short-sightedness of politicians and bureaucrats.

Of course, in Barcelona there is a historic twist. Many of these buildings trace their origins to the depressed decades after the Spanish Civil War, when dictator Francisco Franco brutally suppressed the city. Some buildings were hastily constructed to fill in the destruction caused by bombers during the war. (Barcelona stands out in the annals of modern warfare as the first city systematically bombed from the air.)

After the war, Barcelona suffered under Franco’s regime, which had little interest in preserving the “decadent” architectural style of the defeated city. Grand authoritarian buildings were promoted, demonstrating Franco’s classically fascist tastes. A typical example is the Banco de Espana headquarters on Placa Catalunya, built in 1955, which would seem more at home in 1930s Berlin or old Rome.

Throughout the city, random towers were hastily constricted with designs that purposely ignored the craftsmanship and spirit of the modernist movement or the urban planning elements that defined the city. The 28-story Edificio Colón, completed on the port in 1970, is an office building with a restaurant on top, designed in a semi-brutalist style that probably looked cool and trendy for maybe six months.

The 22-story Torre Urquinaona, completed in 1971, captures the essence of the cheap authoritarian stylings preferred during the Franco years. Lot’s of sharp corners and straights lines, in sharp contrast to flowing curves and whimsy of modernism and Art Nouveau. It looks like Ming the Merciless designed a condo tower.

After Franco’s death, the 1992 Olympics sparked a great building surge, a feverish effort to catch up and create the type of architecturally “significant” projects city leaders believed would make Barcelona a modern city. Developers were allowed to bulldoze huge swatches of the city. Whole communities were displaced. And Barcelona was left with a series of random projects with few links to the city’s famed design aspirations.

In the runup to the Olympics, an Olympic Village was thrown up on the new waterfront, Vila Olímpica, including the city’s new tallest buildings. Of the two, the most striking is the 154-meter-tall, 44-story Hotel Arts, which copies the distinctive exo-skeleton of Chicago’s legendary Hancock building. That’s not surprising, since the hotel was designed by Bruce Graham and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, the same team behind the Hancock building, who apparently cashed in with a small-scale version of their iconic Windy City project.

The other tower developed in what could have been a seminal complex is Torre Mapfre, a bland steel-and-glass office tower that would look great in downtown Fresno. Torre Mapre’s claim to architectural fame, at the time, was “the highest helipad in Spain.”

To add a bit more starchitect flair, Frank Gehry, fresh off earning the Pritzker Prize in 1989, tossed in a 52-meter glimmering fish sculpture, El Peix, as a canopy for the shops and restaurants. And, at the time, the complex created a pleasant image when the world turned its attention to Barcelona and The Games.

But time hasn’t been kind. Today Vila Olímpica survives as a cold, remote hotel, retail and shopping center that has little to do with the rest of the city. (Hotels Arts is operated by Ritz Carlton.) It’s a place for tourists and the crowds frequenting the casino.

In the craze to build new and look modern, Barcelona approved a series of architectural anomalies that speak to architects trying to wow architecture students. You can see city leaders grabbing at design trends, hoping to appear hip, while ignoring the elements that would later define Barcelona as the “world capital of architecture.”

Stark, charmless buildings began appearing throughout the city. In 1993, the fast-expanding, nine-story El Cortes Inglés department store on Plaça de Catalunya, occupying one of the city’s most treasured corners, was reclad into a brutalist fortress.

Beyond Sagrada Familia, the most distinctive building on Barcelona’s skyline is Torre Glòries, a round, glass-coated tower built in 2005 that sticks out of the landscape like a glowing condom. Designed by French architect Jean Nouvel, Glòries is beloved by tall building fans for its natural ventilation system and complex façade. And many locals tout it as an example of a new era of design. But it has little to do with the style, skyline and character of Barcelona, and you can’t not see it.

Architecture fans will also note that Nouvel used almost the same design to better effect in Qatar, with the Doha Tower. That makes Glòries nothing more than Nouvel’s second-best glass condom tower, which hardly stands as a great sell line for the postcards.

As a side note, in recent years the public space around Glòries has been the target of a massive urban renewal project, including new parks and cultural spaces. It is one of the success stories that will be discussed during the World Capital of Architecture events. And Torre Glòries still seems rundown and out of place.

The most hated building in Barcelona might be the W Hotel built in 2009, a glass “sail” on the waterfront with zero connection to anything in the city. The developers ignored Spain’s strict laws for building on the water’s edge. A key piece of land was wasted. Two years after it was finished Spain’s Supreme Court ruled that the construction was illegal, but refused to order it torn down. The “sail” design is also a ripoff of the Burj al Arab “sail” design in Dubai.

Nobody leaves Barcelona talking about the ugly buildings. But there are lessons to be learned from the city’s mistakes. Decisions have long term consequences, and Barcelona is still paying the price.

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In honor of Barcelona’s year-long celebration commemorating the 100^th anniversary of Antoni Gaudí’s death, LEGO is releasing a Sagrada Familia set designed to “reflect both the scale and spirit of Gaudí’s vision.”

The set will include more than 1,200 pieces, making it LEGO’s largest product by piece count. It also carries an $800 price tag.

LEGO takes this stuff seriously. The massive set seeks to “capture the evolving story of Barcelona’s most iconic landmark, with the building steps mirroring the basilica’s actual construction sequence,” according to the press release. Extra time was spent to capture the stained-glass window effect, in order to “echo the unique way light moves through the real basilica.”

“We felt an immense responsibility to do justice to the Sagrada Família through this design,” LEGO Architecture Designer Rok Žgalin Kobe said in the press release. “Our goal was to honor Gaudí’s vision with the utmost respect, capturing the rhythm of the basilica’s construction, its extraordinary complexity and ambition, and translating that into an immersive building experience.”

According to the press release, “builders” will be able to enhance the experience through the LEGO Builder app, which offers “intuitive 3D instructions, progress tracking and the ability to save builds, turning the building process into a guided, immersive journey.”

Sagrada Familia will join projects from around the world that have been immortalized in the toy company’s architecture series. You can also find sets for the Trevi Fountain, Notre Dame and Germany’s Neuschwanstein Castle.

The completed Sagrada Familia model will be 24 inches high, 18.5 inches wide, and 15 inches deep. At this point it is only available for pre-order, with sets expected to ship in November.

You can find all the details on the set and pre-ordering here.

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Sure, La Boqueria is the “most famous” food market in Barcelona and it’s steps off La Rambla. It’s also overcrowded with tours and busloads of people eager to get a free sample of cheese, as well as a fertile hunting ground for local pickpockets.

If you’re jonesing for an authentic Barcelona food market moment, but you’re in that tight tourist time frame, there is an easy alternative not far away from the crush of La Rambla.

Mercat de Santa Caterina is the real deal. A buzzing sea of stalls, it is a short stroll across Via Laietana from the central cathedral, and not far from the Palau de Musica Catalana. When you’re done, the market is also a starting point to dive into El Born from the backside, a labyrinth of alleys, restaurants and shops often missed by short-term travelers.

The site was the original home of a Dominican convent founded in the 13^th century, but was reborn as Barcelona’s first covered market in 1848. A 2005 renovation led by architects Enric Miralles and Benedetta Tagliabue created a modern form of the traditional market, heighted by an undulating roof line with 325,000 colorful ceramic tiles, supported by an intricate steel and wood frame.

Inside, Caterina is a bustling traditional market, serving the local neighborhoods. Stalls offer the fresh meats, fish and vegetables that are the lifeblood of city kitchens. There are also a couple of restaurants offering a spot to take a break and watch the swirl of the community. Without the oppressive tourists throngs of Boqueria, Caterina gives you the sights, smells and authentic experience of a real Barcelona working market.

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Like many tourists, I didn’t really get Barcelona on my first visit. The neighborhoods seemed strangely monotonous and the crowds in the tourist spots were obnoxious. I walked La Rambla, gazed upon Sagrada Familia and joined the throngs herded into a Gaudi house. The city registered as a Paris wannabe with a cool church, little more than a nice stop on a quickie Euro jaunt.

It wasn’t until my third visit, after I had worked through the list of must-do tourist activities, that I started to understand why so many people fall in love with the place. When you sink into the city’s rhythm of life and move away from the tourist zones, you start to discover the real Barcelona, the city that inspires so much loyalty, outrage and bad poetry.

I’m often asked why I’ve become marginally obsessed with the city, a valid question. There are plenty of cities with beautiful old cafes, great history and cool art. I could just as easily be eating tasty pastries and swapping tales of revolution and architecture in a Paris or Copenhagen coffee shop.

On one level, my answer is simple: I’m an architecture and urban planning geek and Barcelona is the best designed city in the world. Fellow urban planning geeks know exactly what I’m talking about. The wide sidewalks, notched corners at the end of the blocks, the sunny corridors — they’re all the product of an urban plan developed in 1860 by Ildefons Cerdà, an innovator in sustainability and healthy cities a century before it was cool to be green. In an era when most cities planned streets around troop movements, Cerdà explored how people live and move through neighborhoods, addressing the poor conditions that plagued so many cities.

Much of the best parts of Cerda’s plans were tossed aside by greedy developers, but the results still can be seen everywhere in the modern Barcelona, from the cafés that line the sidewalks to the fresh air that flows through the wide avenues. It’s easy to walk from block to block because Cerdà spent a lot of time figuring out the appropriate length and height of a city block. The design encourages people to live outdoors in the cafes, squares and parks. Traffic, buses and the metro move naturally through the streets. It is still, and always has been, a city that works, right up until the times it turns into a crazed shitshow, which happens with sad regularity.

The more I learned about Barcelona, the more I became fascinated by the centuries of scandals, tragedies and passions that shaped the city and its culture. Barcelona’s charm and fabled quirkiness are no accident. Battles were fought, decisions made, norms ignored to make Barcelona what it is today. To understand the long-running Catalan independence movement today, you must first appreciate the region’s centuries-old battles with Madrid and Europe, and the tales of irritated queens and ambitious French operators that almost always ended badly for Barcelona.

Beyond journalistic curiosity, digging deeper, my obsession becomes harder to explain.

As soon as I arrive, I’m always amazed at how comfortable I feel in the city. Strolling the streets, I instantly feel like I never left. Within hours I’m eating weird forms of pig in dark cafes in the middle of the night, complaining about noisy garbage pickups and spending too much time sipping cortados and watching old men play bocce ball in the park.

Once you’re away from the tourist areas, Barcelona is remarkably free of the hubris and fast-food chains that provide the landscape for so many cities. Neighborhoods may look the same, but each is unique, defined by the bakeries, markets and wine stores that have been part of the block for generations. An old lady sells vegetables form her cousin’s farm; a shop offers a rare cheese from a little town in Basque country; a cobbler repairs everyone’s shoes, same as his father and his father before that. These neighborhoods have survived crazy kings, Franco and the rise of Wal-Mart.

In Barcelona, I walk obsessively, sometimes just because I’m bored. It is a city that always pays off when you make the wrong turn or decide to walk down a new alley. The city’s history can be found in the nooks and crannies, the labyrinths of old street and the sordid tales reflecting centuries of anarchists and artists; royalty and deceit; celebrations and vendettas.

A bizarre stew of cultures, tragedy and inspiration produced a city with a distinctly different vibe than any other major city in the world. The streets are named after poets and architects, not conquering generals. It is a city that treats art, theater and music as vital parts of the daily environment, from random, outrageous street performers to the opera singer practicing a mournful aria amid the old stone walls. In Barcelona, instead of a ratty dropout trying to play old Beatles songs on an out-of-tune guitar, the street musicians are often trained artists playing jazz and classical music, taking advantage of the acoustics of a secluded spot. You can tell a lot about a city by the quality of the buskers.

On a fundamental, bureaucratic level, Barcelona embraces culture, education and the outrageous. The city’s identity and tourism industry are built around the flamboyant designs of art nouveau, a movement that flips the bird to old traditions and rigid thinking. Among its long line of festivals and parties, every April the city celebrates the Saint Jordi Festival by sharing books and roses. There are no military parades in Barcelona, but there are regular massive, traffic-snarling demonstrations around global peace, worker rights and equity issues.

It is, without a doubt, a city with flaws. Tourists overrun the neighborhoods in the summer; graffiti scars the old buildings and there is a seedy veneer to many of the old streets. In the dark corners of Raval, not far from the tourist throngs, you might see hippies shooting heroin in a picturesque cobblestone alley and the guy next to you in the bar in Poble Sec may or may not work for the Russian mob. And it is true that many of the world’s best pickpockets operate in the city.

All those things are true and none of it matters. Catalonia’s historic knack for landing on the wrong side of war and politics has produced a resilient spirit, a sense of nationalism and pride that remains a very real part of the modern Barcelona. The outside world, and the scandal du jour don’t really matter. The city succeeds and grows and remains a great place to live and visit, despite all the weirdness and turmoil. In 2017, after a horrible terrorist attack on La Rambla, tens of thousands took to the streets to chant, “we are not afraid.” That is Barcelona.

In the real Barcelona, which has nothing to do with the tourist Barcelona, not everything fits the postcard images. The heroes are often damaged; the fables often end badly. The stories don’t quite fit the myths. There is context and a story to everything about the city. The great buildings are the product of craftsmen and builders who were oppressed and manipulated by the city’s elite for generations. The beach is sunny and fun and completely man-made. The rewards go to those willing to sink into the city and discover what makes it different and worthy of stirring Catalan ballads.

As a journalist, I love that there is a story behind every corner. That feeling never goes away in Barcelona. No matter how much I learn, I am constantly reminded that my perspective is that of an outsider, a dumbass American experiencing a city built over generations. After years visiting and living in the city, I am keenly aware that I am no more than a guest, and it would be arrogant and foolish of me to think I will ever really understand this place.

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Barcelona’s city government last week fired a salvo across the bow of the cruise industry, voting to double taxes on transit passengers and reduce the number of available terminals. The ultimate goal is to eliminate all cruise ship stopovers in the city, Mayor Jaume Collboni told reporters, in the biggest move yet to change the paradigm of mass tourism in the city.

While the pronouncement will certainly induce some eye rolling —another example of wacky Barcelona’s anti-tourism campaign! —Barcelona’s leaders are taking real action to stem the flood of tourists swamping the streets. Last year saw record activity in cruise activity, with 832 calls and more than 3.9 million passengers wandering La Rambla and lining up for tour buses.

Ultimately, leaders make decisions about what kind of city they want, and Barcelona’s City Council is fighting back against a tourism industry that many people believe has done real damage to the city. The council has already backed plans to eliminate licenses for Airbnb and similar short-term rental units.

Barcelona mayor’s proposal would not ban cruise ships, only the quick stops that deposit thousands of people into the streets only to see them leave in a few hours. Barcelona would still be used as a home port, which encourages passengers to stay in the city before or after their voyage.

The city is trying to encourage a cruise industry that brings people to the city’s hotels and restaurants, instead of simply using the city as a theme park for daily visitors who clog the roads and streets and don’t even buy lunch. Beyond tour operators and souvenir shops, cities often see little benefit from the cruise ship onslaught.

In the short term, the city doubled the tax on passengers who spend less than 12 hours in the city to 8 euros. It will also reduce the number of cruise ship terminals from seven to five, a concrete step that suggests it is serious about reconfiguring the port economy.

The city says it will use money raised by the new fees to improve the tourism infrastructure and develop more local housing, which remains to be seen. But Barcelona is moving beyond talk to take real action. Some may disagree, but at least the city is showing a willingness to step back from the buffet and rethink its approach to mass tourism.

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The Spanish Civil War and Franco’s devastating reign over the city remain the seminal, cataclysmic events that shaped the modern Barcelona. Little known to many outside Spain — especially in the U.S. — the struggle against fascism in Barcelona degenerated into strife and nightmare, creating a lasting symbol of the heartbreak and loss that continue to plague the city’s complicated psyche.

Nick Lloyd’s tours are well known in Barcelona as a starting point for any discussion of the war. Nick is the author of “Forgotten Places: Barcelona and the Spanish Civil War,” as well as the recently released, “Travels Through the Spanish Civil War” (links below). He has a passion for bringing the stories of the war to life and humanizing the horrible events that tore apart families and neighborhoods for generations.

Check out the book

The Gothic Quarter tour is a stroll through the chaos, terror and tragedies of the war. The stories and details will resonate whether you are an expert on the war or a neophyte. Many sites vividly remain, such as the pockmarked stones walls of the church of Sant Felip Neri, where in Jan. 1938 bombs from Italian planes killed 42 people, primarily children huddled in a shelter. Barcelona was one of the first major cities to face systematic bombardment from the sky, and the scars are found throughout the old city.

On the tour, you will also learn about the mélange of Stalinists, Trotskyites, anarchists and Catalan nationalists that fought for control of the city during the war. There was nothing simple or clean about the anti-fascist cause in Barcelona. Savage and bloody fighting broke out between the various groups. Author George Orwell was famously swept up in events, which he chronicled in his book “Homage to Catalonia.” The tour takes you to Orwell’s wartime haunts, where he struggled to stay alive amid the battles between the city’s warring factions.

The tour takes four hours and usually starts from Placa Catalunya. Tours are led in English, but Nick speaks Spanish, as well. It’s best to book early, spots fill up.

Here’s the link to the Spanish Civil War Tour site for more info.

Click for Spanish Civil War Tour info

And here is a link for Nick’s new book:

Click for more info

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The latest report from Mark Stücklin at Spanish Property Insight suggests the Spanish government’s campaign against foreign property buyers is starting to have an impact. New data from the Spanish Notaries Association shows home purchases in 2025 by non-resident buyers from outside the EU — think Brits and Americans — were down 17% year-on-year.

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