BarcelonaDOING BUSINESS INFINANCIAL TIMES SPECIAL REPORT | Wednesday April 29 2009

Playing its own gameSimon Kuper on whyFC Barcelona – one of whosestar players,Lionel Messi,is pictured –is ‘more thana club’

Page 6

www.ft.com/barcelona­2009

Elegant portseeks to rideout the storm

Woody Allen’slatest film,Vicky CristinaBarcelona, has

plenty of detractors – Span-iards in particular havemocked the improbableromantic plots involving twonaïve American holidaymak-ers and a pair of passionateSpanish artists – but the cityof Barcelona is not complain-ing about the free publicity.

Like Cédric Klapisch’s ear-lier L’Auberge Espagnole(Pot Luck in the Englishtitle), a multilingual tale ofstudent life in a sharedapartment, the film is set inthe sunny, architecturallyelegant and socially tolerantBarcelona of contemporaryreality. Dark underbellies,dirt and violence arereserved for the human char-acters, not the urban setting.

Barcelona broadlydeserves the accoladesimplicit in the films. Sincethe city transformed itself tohost the 1992 OlympicGames, sweeping away theunwanted debris of theindustrial revolution andreplacing it with beaches,buildings and infrastructureto suit the modern era, it hasthrived as a Mediterraneancentre for both commerceand tourism.

The city has not escapedthe global economic crisis, afeat impossible for such anexport-oriented metropolis.But it has been rather lessdependent on the home con-struction boom and frothyreal estate market than therest of Spain’s south andeast coasts, retaining a use-fully diversified economythat includes functioning carplants, publishing compa-nies, biotechnology firms,fashion houses and touristhotels as well as abandonedbuilding sites.

“Barcelona and the Barce-lona area still keep a nicebalance between manufac-turing and services, which issomething you can’t say of alot of European cities,” saysJordi Canals, dean of theIese business school.

As if to underline manu-facturing’s continued contri-bution to Catalonia’s pros-perity, Volkswagen said lastweek that it would build itsnew Audi Q3 compact sportutility vehicle not in the USbut at its Seat subsidiary’sMartorell plant just outsideBarcelona. Audi’s €300minvestment is expected tosave about 1,200 jobs.

Such investment decisionshave been made easier byimprovements to Barcelona’stransport infrastructure.Catalonia has complainedfor years that Madrid allo-cates too small a share ofSpain’s public investmentbudget to projects in theregion, but the combinedefforts of the Spanish state,the regional government, thecity authorities and the pri-vate sector are making tan-gible improvements.

The most obvious changefor business visitors is lastyear’s opening of the Ave orhigh-speed train routebetween Madrid and Barce-lona. True, it was six yearsbehind schedule, but thereduction in journey time toless than three hours makesBarcelona convenientlyaccessible from the capital –and vice versa.

The airport, meanwhile, isto open a new terminal, andthe commercial port is dou-bling its container handlingcapacity. Some large projectshave been plagued over theyears by accidents or contro-versies, but foreign investorsare enthusiastic about thenew transport links andabout the city’s increasinglyinternational outlook.

“The infrastructurebecame better,” says Fumi-aki Matsumoto, managingdirector of Nissan’s Barce-lona vehicle plant and a

vice-president of NissanEurope, who worked in Bar-celona a decade ago andrecently returned. “Andmore people speak English.This is a change. Ten yearsago it was quite difficult toconverse with people in Eng-lish.”

With international open-ness so important for Barce-lona’s and Catalonia’s eco-nomic success, the city’slocation – between the bulkof Spain and the northernheart of the EuropeanUnion, and also facing theMediterranean and theemerging markets of northAfrica – remains a strategicadvantage.

“We’re the south of thenorth and the north of thesouth and that’s an interest-ing position in the years thatmust come,” says JordiHereu, Barcelona’s mayor, inan office adorned with worksof art by local painters JoanMiró and Ramon Casas. Bar-celona was duly chosen –after much lobbying – as theheadquarters of the newUnion for the Mediterraneanpromoted by NicolasSarkozy, French president.

Barcelona also benefitsfrom a business culture thatgoes back centuries. It waswith Barcelona’s textileindustry that the industrialrevolution came to Spain,and the Foment del TreballNacional, which dates from1771, says it is the oldestemployers’ group in Europe.

Catalonia, economicallydominated by Barcelona,accounts for 27 per cent ofSpain’s exports and 39 percent of its high-technologyexports, and hosts more than3,000 foreign companies.“Things work well, the cli-mate is good and we arevery open to Europe,” saysJoan Rosell i Lastortras,Foment chairman.

Barcelona, however, stillneeds to overcome the imme-diate crisis and to ensure itscompetitiveness as a busi-ness city in the long term.“At the moment,” says MrRosell, “the problem is thefinancing of small compa-nies, the fall of consumptionand the destruction ofemployment.”

Future, post-crisis chal-lenges can be divided intothose that face the whole ofSpain and those peculiar toCatalonia and its capitalBarcelona.

Business people in thecity, along with their coun-terparts in Madrid or Bilbao,believe that the governmentof José Luis Rodríguez Zapa-tero, the Socialist prime min-ister, should use the crisis topush through overdue eco-nomic reforms, even thoughthey admit he shows fewsigns of doing so.

Priorities for business

include a liberalisation ofSpanish labour laws, whichare currently very favoura-ble to employees and dis-courage the hiring of perma-nent staff, and a reduction ofred tape. Barcelona may bemore entrepreneurial andhave better universities thanthe Spanish average, but itstill lags some of its Euro-pean rivals.

A generally favourablereport* published this yearby the Organisation for Eco-nomic Co-operation andDevelopment speaks of pos-sible “deficiencies in theBarcelona knowledge econ-omy” not only in biotechnol-ogy and life sciences but alsoin information and commu-nications technology. “Thesesectors are strong but alsodisplay relatively low levelsof entrepreneurship,” thereport says.

Then there are mattersspecific to Catalonia, or, tobe more accurate, to thedevolved nature of the Span-ish constitution and the wayit is applied. The regionalgovernment has vigorouslyexercised and sought toexpand its autonomy andhas promoted the Catalanlanguage in education, thebureaucracy and the media.

Catalan nationalists canbe extremely prickly aboutany criticism of these poli-cies from outsiders. First,they remind listeners oftheir historic resentment ofdominance by Madrid andsecond, they point out –rightly – that Spanish speak-ers have no problem con-versing in castellano ratherthan Catalan on the streetsof Barcelona.

What is spoken on thestreets, however, is not theonly issue. By overpromot-ing Catalonia’s uniquenessand playing down the inter-dependence between theregion and the rest of Spain,Catalan nationalists haveneedlessly alienated somepowerful people in Madrid,puzzled the few foreignerswho pay attention to localpolitics and failed to capital-ise on Barcelona’s attractive-ness as a Spanish gateway.

“You can’t just thinkabout Barcelona withoutthinking of the future of Bar-celona in Spain,” says Iese’sProf Canals.

José Luis Blanco, manag-ing partner in Spain of inter-national law firm Latham &Watkins, agrees. “It’s absurdto look at Europe and turnyour back on Spain,” hesays. “Barcelona needs tostop trying to sell itself asthe capital of Catalonia, andsell itself as the influentialcity of Spain.”

Mr Blanco is also con-cerned that the longstandingreluctance of Barcelona’scautious entrepreneurs toraise money through thecapital markets has limitedtheir growth, in contrast totheir peers in Madrid. In thedepths of the crisis, this Cat-alan restraint looks wise,especially against the back-ground of collapsing, highly-leveraged companies in prop-erty and finance. Even so,says Mr Blanco: “It’s extra-ordinarily hard to cross thecompetitive barriers withouthaving a certain size.”

Still, few of those who dobusiness in Barcelona wouldbegrudge the city’s claim tobe an attractive mix of man-ufacturing, tourism and newsectors such as biotechnol-ogy and entertainment. Norwould they probably quibblewith the mayor Mr Hereu’sclaim that the city “is in aprocess of urban transforma-tion as important as at anytime its history”.

Above all, Barcelona hasbecome a brand representingenergy, culture and creativ-ity. Those qualities made itan obvious European substi-tute for Woody Allen’sbeloved New York when hechose the setting for VickyCristina Barcelona.

*Promoting entrepreneurship,employment and businesscompetitiveness: the experi-ence of Barcelona.www.oecd.org/cefe/leed

The city has thrivedas a centre forcommerce andtourism, writesVictor Mallet

InsideInterview Mark Mulliganand Victor Mallet interviewBarcelona’s mayor, JordiHereu Page 2

Who’s Who Eight of thecity’s leading personalities,including Anna Veiga(pictured below), areprofiled Page 3

Biotechnology Barcelonais keen to promote itselfas a centre of excellencein this field Page 4

Motor industry Despitejob cuts,there issomegoodnewsin thesectorPage 5

Barcelona hasbecome a brandrepresentingenergy, cultureand creativity

Unemployment rate%

6

8

10

12

14

Spain

Barcelona

2005 06 07 08

GDP per capita€’000

1995 96 97 98 99 2000 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08

10

15

20

25

30CataloniaBarcelonaSpain

Foreign direct investments

Source: Idescat, INE

% of GDP

2000 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08

0.5

1.0

1.5

2.0

2.5

3.0

3.5

4.0

4.5

Catalonia

Spain

Note: Barcelona refers to Barcelona province

Funnel vision: detail from rooftop of Casa Mila, designed by Antoni Gaudí Dreamstime

2 ★ FINANCIAL TIMES WEDNESDAY APRIL 29 2009

Doing Business in Barcelona

ContributorsVictor MalletMadrid Bureau Chief

Mark MulliganMadrid Correspondent

Xavier VivesProfessor of Economicsand Finance,Iese Business School

Andrew BaxterCommissioning Editor

Steven BirdDesigner

Andy MearsPicture Editor

For advertising details,contact: Maria Gonzalez+34 91 564 1810Fax +34 91 564 1255E­mail :maria.gonzalez@ft.comor your usual FTrepresentative

Gaining strength from diversity

Behind the 19th century neo-classical façade of Barce-lona’s city hall, or ajunta-ment, there are a couple ofhistorical and artistic treas-ures. In the Saló de Cent, or“Hall of the Hundred” theGothic vaulting and intri-cately-carved wooden beamsdate from the original 14thcentury structure.

In the otherwise plain,functional office of JordiHereu, the mayor, an origi-nal work by modernist Joan

Miró sits alongide more som-bre Catalan masters.

Like the city itself, thehome of local government istorn between its rich historyand the demands of a mod-ern global economy.

“The economy of Barce-lona, and Catalonia, wasbased on a few very tradi-tional industrial sectors –such as agro-industry, carsand components, chemicals,and pharmaceuticals,” saysMr Hereu. “However, overthe years services have cometo predominate.”

“Now, in the last 10 years,Barcelona has invested a lotof its energy in what I wouldterm emerging sectors, suchas audiovisual production,design, information technol-ogy, life sciences and renew-

able energy. These are areasthat in 2008, a very compli-cated year, generated 20 percent employment growthcompared with 2007.”

He admits that these “neweconomy” sectors carry littleweight in the make-up of thecity’s gross domestic prod-uct, in which tourism stillaccounts for about 15 percent and residential con-struction 6 per cent. “How-ever these are sectors with agreat deal of potential that,even in the middle of a cri-sis, can create jobs,” he says.

Finding the right mix ofmanufacturing, services andcreative and high-tech busi-nesses is the key to Barce-lona’s future success, hesays. While in the 19th cen-tury it prospered as the

“Manchester of Spain”, andthen in the late 20th centuryas a centre of low-cost manu-facturing, design and tour-ism, Barcelona’s strengthwill increasingly depend ondiversity, he says.

“We have a diversifiedeconomy,” he says. “There isno one sector that representsmore than 20 per cent of out-put. This is an advantage intimes like this.”

Another shield against theglobal downturn is publicspending on infrastructure.In Barcelona, which oftencreaks under the weight oftourists traipsing its streetsand using its services, thestate of municipal amenitiesand transport connections isa popular topic of conversa-tion. A commitment by

municipal, regional and cen-tral government on upgrad-ing the city’s infrastructureis helping to offset thedecline in private sectorinvestment, he says.

“This is a globalised city,and as such is intimatelyconnected to the global econ-omy,” says Mr Hereu.“Although the crisis is a glo-bal phenomenon, we have todeal with it locally.”

Tax break helps city make exhibition of itself

As the global economiccrisis casts a pall oversome of Catalonia’smost important indus-

trial sectors, small victories arebeing celebrated as if they wereresounding triumphs.

The fact that this year’s Auto-mobile Fair is going ahead asplanned in Barcelona is a case inpoint. After the cancellation lastmonth of next year’s biennialLondon Motor Show, there werefears that the city’s own “SalónInternacional de Automóvil”,held every two years in May,would suffer the same fate.

After all, as the centre of auto-motive assembly in Spain, Cata-

lonia is acutely aware of the dev-astating impact of the crisis onSpanish car sales, which havefallen by nearly half, and produc-tion, where thousands of workershave either been laid off or hadhours and pay reduced.

With the car show on the brinkof suspension, Spain’s centralgovernment came to the rescuewith a tax break that not onlyconvinced manufacturers toexhibit, but drew direct sponsor-ship from some of the region’sbiggest non-automotive compa-nies.

By declaring tax-deductibleexpenditure by exhibitors andsponsors on any advertisingrelated to the fair, authoritiesappear to have rescued the show.The tax break is contingent onthe use of the “Salón Interna-tional de Automóvil” logo in allsuch advertising, meaning theevent gets a much-needed promo-tional boost.

“The crisis is a reality, and avery hard one at that,” saysJosep Lluís Bonet, chairman of

the Fira de Barcelona, the public-private sector joint venture thatmanages the city’s exhibitionshalls and events.

“But it is also true that in thismoment, companies have to besharper than ever, look harderfor sales, and become more com-petitive. In this sense, trade fairshave a lot of offer.”

While regular trade fair partici-pants would probably agree, thecosts of travelling, contractingexhibition space and mountingstands has become a luxury formany small and medium-sizedbusinesses and, as the LondonMotor Show case shows, largemultinationals as they look tocut costs.

Organisers reported a 10 percent drop in participation at thismonth’s Tourism Fair, whileattendance at Construmat, Barce-lona’s signature business-to-busi-ness fair for the constructionindustry, is likely to be hit hardby the dramatic downturn inSpanish homebuilding, and sec-tor malaise around the world.

However, for companies whocan still follow the exhibition cir-cuit this year, the crisis throwsup new opportunities, accordingto José Luis Nueno, marketingprofessor at the Iese businessschool.

“Most trade shows are aboutmaking contacts, checking out

the competition and finding newsuppliers,” he says.

Although there will be notableabsences at many fairs this year– many participants have ceasedto exist, for a start – there haveso far been no cancellations.According to Turisme de Barce-lona, the city’s tourism promo-tion office, the same goes for the

heavy programme of conventionsand congresses.

The Association of BritishTravel Agents, to name but one,has chosen Barcelona for thisyear’s annual congress, which isoften held in the Canary Islands.Organisers were convinced bygenerous local sponsorship andfree use of the city’s Interna-tional Convention Centre. Thecity is also gearing up for theinaugural World InnovationSummit, a three-day trade fairand speakers’ symposium inJune which organisers say willbring together the most innova-tive people, companies and ideasin the world.

Despite Catalonia’s deep rootsin textiles, farming, industrialdesign and tourism, Barcelonahas been keen of late to projectan image of itself as a centre oftechnological innovation. Therole of the Fira de Barcelona tothis end has been vital.

The continuing success of theannual Mobile World Congress,recognised as the most important

gathering of wireless telephonyoperators and product makers inthe world, has made the city syn-onymous with the latest industrygadgets and technology. Simi-larly, Barcelona, with its historyof medical research and world-class hospitals, has also becomethe global centre of conferencesfor specialists such as cardiolo-gists and gynaecologists.

Along with many importantindustrial cities, Barcelona has along and colourful tradition oftrade fairs, starting with its host-ing of the Universal Expositionsin 1888 and 1929. Fira was for-mally established in 1932, as thecity’s handsome exhibition com-plex was built at the base ofMontjuic Mountain, south-east ofcentral Barcelona.

Today the zone boasts 165,000sq m of usable pavilion space anda further 50,000 sq min the openair. Two years ago, Fira inaugu-rated a further 200,000 sq m ofspace in nearby Gran Via, consol-idating one of the biggest exhibi-tion spaces in Europe. Fira

boasts a portfolio of 80 differentshows, bringing together an esti-mated 40,000 companies.

This expansion reflects theimportance of trade fairs andcongresses on the city’s econ-omy. According to one study bythe Fira, the direct and indirectimpact equates to about €2.5bn ayear, after accounting for spend-ing by participants inside andoutside the exhibition space,business arising as a result ofnew contacts made, and workers’wages.

Considering Fira´s revenueslast year of €122m, up 17 per centon the comparable 2006, the mul-tiplier effect is considerable.

“Trade fair are very potentinstruments of innovation,” saysMr Bonet.

“They act as dynamos on soci-ety, on companies and on theeconomy. However, the tradefairs themselves have to be con-stantly innovating. In these diffi-cult times, Fira has to redoubleits efforts just as any companywould.”

TRADE FAIRS

The biennial car showhas been rescued andother events areholding their own,writes Mark Mulligan

The annual MobileWorld Congress hasmade the citysynonymous with thelatest gadgets

Global outlook putsschools in top class

These are testing time forthe world’s business schools.Corporate cost-cuts meancustomised executive educa-tion, often the schools’ mostlucrative business, is sud-denly an unaffordable lux-ury.

Restricted travel budgetscan also preclude trips foron-campus open courses, nomatter how short the jour-ney and stay. Schools arebeing forced to tailor theseto more modest budgets. Inthe US, particularly, marketturbulence has shrunkendowments, which meansless scholarship and studentassistance.

If all this were not enough,business schools’ values andteaching methods, too, haveagain come under scrutinyas the world seeks to appor-tion blame for the globalfinancial crisis.

However, there is a brightlight amid all the gloom,according to experts atEsade and Iese, the Barcelo-na-based business schools.

With the sudden surge inthe number of bankers, man-agers and executives eitherout of work, worried abouttheir future, or reflecting ontheir career choices, theyhave noted an increase inthe number of applicants totheir MBA programmes.

“People are saying: ‘I’vealways wanted to do anMBA – it’s either now ornever’,” says Mike Rosen-berg, director of interna-tional executive education atIese. “The world’s leadingschools are being swampedwith applications for theirMBA courses,”

Both Iese and Esade residecomfortably in this category,constantly ranking in thetop 10 of European businessschools, and often in the top10 globally.

They form two-thirds of aSpanish business school tri-umvirate – the other isMadrid-based Instituto deEmpresa – that have madethe country, and especiallyBarcelona, synonymous withhigh-quality business educa-tion.

Their increasing attractionto foreign students – non-Spaniards consistently

account for about 80 per centof MBA course intake – con-trasts sharply with theallure of standard, state-rununiversities in Spain.

It was perhaps because ofthe low standard of tertiaryeducation in Spain, and theuniversities’ lack of interna-tional scope, that the coun-try’s most successful busi-ness schools had to be pri-vate initiatives.

The Barcelona institutionsare among the oldest of theirtype in Europe, and havemore than their geographi-cal situation in common.

For a start, both are linkedto regular universities withCatholic roots: Iese is tied tothe Opus Dei-run Universi-dad de Navarra, whileEsade, co-founded by theJesuit order, also offersundergraduate law and man-agement degrees.

Both are also pioneers ininternationalisation, realis-ing early on the value ofbuilding global alliances,teaching in English, hiringfaculty with vast interna-tional experience, and pro-

viding a cosmopolitan envi-ronment for students.

Being based in Barcelona,with its beaches, Mediterra-nean climate, vibrant night-life, and affordable accom-modation, also gives theman edge in selection by stu-dents.

“Somebody who studies anMBA is taking a risk,” saysXavier Mendoza, a businessprofessor at Esade, “andthey want the school toreduce that risk”.

“They expect the school todeliver on all the fundamen-tal requirements – coursework, faculty, business con-nections and so on.

“Beyond that, a schoolneeds five or six unique fac-tors: being based in Barce-lona, when students can alsostudy Spanish, can certainlycount here.”

Full-time MBA studentAmitabh D’Souza of Indiasays he considered institu-tions in France and the UKbefore opting for Esade.“Basically, I spent nineyears studying and working

in Asia, and then worked fortwo years in the US,” hesays. “I needed a Europeanexperience. I liked the ideaof Barcelona, and had heardgood things about Esade.”

This global view of busi-ness, common among MBAstudents in their late-20s orearly 30s, is starting tofavour European schools.Interest from the US hassurged in recent years,reflecting a growing desireby Americans to exposethemselves to foreign cul-tures while taking a moreglobal view of business.

Iese, for one, responded tothis trend by opening a sat-ellite campus in New YorkCity two years ago, in abuilding it is currently refur-bishing in the centre of Man-hattan. When completednext year, it will serve as aresearch centre, alumni cluband campus for modules ofIese’s executive MBA andglobal executive MBAcourses.

The project follows therecent expansion of Iese’sBarcelona campus, where itspent €25m on a state-of-the-art executive education cen-tre over 18,000 squaremetres.

Esade, too, has just openeda new, 20,000 sq m campus inSant Cugat, about 20km out-side Barcelona, for under-graduate and masters busi-ness administration stu-dents. The new campus istied to Creapolis, an adjacentbusiness research and devel-opment centre and eventualhome to about 50 companies.

Only by forging evercloser links with companiesand their development canbusiness schools stay freshand relevant, says LuisPalencia, associate dean forMBAs at Iese.

Schools also have toassume some responsibilityfor the poor state of the glo-bal economy today, saysAlfons Sauquet, dean ofEsade. After the account-ancy scandal at Enron, theUS energy group, and simi-lar cases of corporate wrong-doing, schools were forced toevaluate their role in thecreation of dishonest busi-ness leaders and their cul-ture of greed.

Mr Sauquet says: “Thiscrisis will be another cata-lyst, exposing the schoolsthat didn’t take on board thelessons of the last crisis, andhelping consolidate anddeepen the reform process atthose that did.”

BUSINESS EDUCATION

Mark Mulligan onthe growingreputations ofIese and Esade

Life returns to moribund quarter

Wandering the fashionablePasseig de Grácia, orsprawled on the beachunder a Meditterraneansun, it is sometimes easy toforget that Barcelona citywas once part of what isnow its industrialhinterland.

Although long a centre ofcultural and artisticendeavour, large sections ofthe Catalan capital weregiven over to mills,foundries and otherfactories throughout the19th century and well intothe 20th.

The Poble Nou district,which fans out for about200 blocks north and eastfrom the city centre, wasthe focus of all this grimy,noisy activity. At the peakof productive output, thethen-remote neighbourhoodwas know as the“Manchester of Spain”.

However, like the UKcity, it has, in recentdecades, succumbed tochanging technologies,

outsourcing, and therelocation of heavy industryaway from city centres.Between 1970 and 1991,Poble Nou lost more than25 per cent of itspopulation. More than 1,300businesses disappearedbetween 1963 and 1990.

Then, encouraged byBarcelona’s successfulmakeover for the 1992Olympic Games, municipaland regional authoritiesdecided that something hadto be done to return life tothe moribund quarter.

The result was22@Barcelona, a 120-hectarepublic-private re-zoningproject aimed at creatingfive high-tech commercialand research hubs –dedicated to media,renewable energy, medicine,information technology anddesign – interspersed withsubsidised and privatehousing, green space andpublic schools, sportsfacilities and medicalclinics.

Named after a re-zoningby-law – 22a – the urbanrenewal project was slow toget off the ground.

It was hit first by theslump in corporateinvestment following thebursting of the internettechnology bubble. Thencity and regional planners

realised that procuring themassive industrial sites anddealing with protectedresidential tenants,sub-lessors and squatterswould be best left to theprofessionals.

Private-sector companiesspecialising in urbanredevelopment wereincorporated to chase upowners, buy the propertiesand then manage theirdevelopment according to22@Barcelona’s strictspecifications.

Throughout all this themainly elderly residentswere hard to convince,complaining that the projectwould drive up rents andalienate further a districtthat had already sufferedmore than most. Manyremain cynical, but thistime because the project istaking so long to complete.Critics, meanwhile, say theoriginal plan, for a sort of aSilicon Valley of Barcelona,has been diluted, and that

22@Barcelona has insteadbecome just anotherbusiness park with anelement of research anddevelopment.

In fact, according torecent studies, about a thirdof the companies nowestablished in the zone areinvolved in the researchand development of newideas and technologies.

Even as the credit crisisand economic decline bite,cranes, scaffolding andcomplex traffic detoursattest to city officials’claims that the once-derelictdistrict has become one ofEurope’s biggest buildingsites. According to JosepMiquel Piqué, chiefexecutive of 22@Barcelona,the development is now 70per cent schemed out, and35 per cent completed.

At the end of last year,Poble Nou was home to1,441 companies employing42,000 people. According toseveral studies, about halfthe district’s workers areuniversity-educated.

“The knowledge economyhas talent as its rawmaterial,” says Mr Piqué,“which means that citiesare central to the neweconomy. Those cities thatunderstand this role, andwhich can attract thetalent, will take the lead as

global cities.”The refitted factories and

purpose-built office blockssprouting up around thedistrict have drawn trophytenants.

Indra, a Spanish softwaregroup, was one of thezone’s first residents, alongwith GTD, anothertechnology company servingthe aeronautical industry.Work on a media centre isnearly finished.

Alstom, the Frenchengineering group, isanother key tenant, havingestablished its globalresearch base for cleanenergy in 22@Barcelona.Schneider, also of France,moved its Europeanheadquarters to the district.

Mr Piqué admits that therate of new tenancies andprivate sector investment inconstruction has slowedwith the global crisis.However, investment bypublic sector departments,regulators, research centresand universities is helpingto compensate.

“There are a few projectson hold because of thecredit crunch,” he says.“However, the number ofbuilding permits issued lastyear was higher than allprevious years.”

“We have not stopped –far from it.”

DISTRICT PROFILEPOBLE NOU

Mark Mulligan ona revival aroundthe 22@Barcelonare­zoning project

The once­derelictdistrict has becomeone of Europe’sbiggest buildingsites, claim officials

Building for the future: the 22@Barcelona re­zoning project in Poble Nou Mattia Insolera

INTERVIEWJORDI HEREU

Mark Mulliganand Victor Malletmeet the mayor

The Barcelonainstitutions areamong the oldestof their typein Europe

Hereu: spending pledge

FINANCIAL TIMES WEDNESDAY APRIL 29 2009 ★ 3

Doing Business in Barcelona

Movers and shakers in city and region

Salvador AlemanyAs chief executive of Abertis, the infra-structure group partly controlled by LaCaixa, Salvador Alemany, 65, is knownin business circles as both an astuteleader and a team player. Married withtwo children and four grandchildren,he was schooled first in economics atthe University of Barcelona, and latercompleted a diploma in business man-agement at Iese Business School. He iscurrently chairman of the Cercled’Economia (Economic Circle) in Barce-lona. Apart from the business of tollroads, satellites, airports and otherinfrastructure his great passion is bas-ketball. Mr Alemany chairs the eco-nomic commission of the Euroleague,the sport’s governing body in Europe,and is also part of the consultativecommittee of the Association of Basket-ball Clubs. He was a driving force inattempts by Abertis to merge withAutostrade, of Italy, in 2006. Despite hisown intensive lobbying in Rome, thedeal was blocked by the government ofRomano Prodi.

Isak AndicAlthough discreet, and not given topublic appearances, Isak Andic is easyto identify as the man behind Mango,Spain’s most successful fashiondesigner and retailer after Inditex.Together with brother Nahman, hefounded the company in 1984, afterusing his spare time between univer-sity studies to sell shirts imported fromTurkey at a flea market in Barcelona.Over the years, he has built the Mangoname and franchise into a global brandwith points of sale in more than 90countries. Little is known about hisprivate life, except that he was born inTurkey, and emigrated with his par-ents to Barcelona at the age of 16.Forbes magazine listed him in 2007 asthe world’s 264th richest man, with anet worth at the time of $3.4bn. It alsosays he is married with three children.He is 53 years old. Apart from his roleas chairman of Mango, Mr Andic is anon-executive director at BancoSabadell, a Catalan bank.

Jordi CanalsJordi Canals’ energy and his unlinedface at the age of 48 may have some-thing to do with his austere lifestyle asa devotee of Opus Dei, the RomanCatholic organisation behind Iese Busi-ness School, of which he is the dean.But with his good-humoured advice onmanagement, corporate governanceand economic policy, Prof Canalswields a quiet influence with politi-cians, bankers and business leadersthat belies his youthful appearance. Hehas published 14 books and beeninvolved in a range of institutions andtask forces, including the World Bankand the International Monetary Fund.The global economic recession has onlyincreased the demand for his measured

views. “The current crisis makes usrealise that we know almost nothing,”he modestly told an interviewerrecently. Bedtime reading? Aristotle’sNicomachean Ethics, of course.

Isidre FainéAs chairman of La Caixa, the leadingfinancial institution of Catalonia, andas a self-made man with an inspiringpersonal history, 66-year-old IsidreFainé is arguably the most importantfigure in Barcelona business. Mr Fainéwas born into a modest farming familyand at the age of 13 was earning a fewpesetas a week in a bicycle repair shop,but he moved into the city to work in afactory before applying for a job at abank and taking evening classes in eco-nomics. Now – as the boss of La Caixa,chairman of Abertis, the infrastructuregroup, and a director of other wellknown Spanish companies – Mr Fainéis confronted with an economic reces-sion the likes of which the country hasnot seen since the civil war. La Caixa,however, is said by bankers and busi-nesspeople to be resisting better thanmost of its peers.

José MontillaAs head of the Catalonia Socialist party(PSC) and of the autonomous regionalgovernment, the soft-spoken Mr Mon-tilla is – for the moment – the mostimportant politician in Barcelona andCatalonia, although he was not born aCatalan. The Catalan nationalist Con-vergencia i Unió won more votes thanany other party in the 2006 regionalelection, but it is with Mr Montilla andhis green and left-wing coalition alliesthat the central government of JoséLuis Rodríguez Zapatero, the Socialistprime minister, must negotiate overthe vexed issue of regional financesand the division of tax revenuesbetween Madrid and the region. At thestart of Mr Zapatero’s first administra-tion, Mr Montilla held the powerfulpost of national minister for industry,commerce and tourism, before becom-ing Catalonia’s premier in 2006. He wasborn in Córdoba in the impoverishedsouthern region of Andalucía, and,along with many of the PSC’s Andalu-cian-born supporters, migrated north toindustrialised Catalonia in search ofwork.

Josep RamonedaIf Barcelona is a city of culture andpublishing, then who better to repre-sent it than Josep Ramoneda? A philos-opher, writer and political commenta-tor, he is founder and director of theCentre for Contemporary Culture ofBarcelona. Mr Ramoneda has publishednumerous books, including After thePolitical Passion in 1999, contributesregularly to the left-leaning nationaldaily newspaper El País, and has estab-lished a collection of philosophy texts.In a prescient column for the FT

WHO’S WHO

Victor Mallet andMark Mulligan profileeight leading personalitiesin a wide range of fields

A way out of the crisis

The current economic crisisis hitting metropolitanareas around the world, andBarcelona is no exception.

Barcelona is alsovulnerable because itsrecent growth has beenpartly fuelled by theextraordinary expansion ofconstruction and real estatein Spain and rising tourismnumbers, both of whichhave now gone into reverse.The low interest-rate policyof the European CentralBank led to negative realinterest rates, divertingresources from industry andadvanced services towardsreal estate.

However, Barcelona doeshave the advantage of amore diversified economythan most of the rest ofSpain, and it managed inspite of the real estateboom to maintain itsindustrial traditions andstay attractive to dynamic,internationally competitivecompanies.

This diversity – theweight of industry in grossvalue added is higher, andthe weight of constructionlower, than in Spain as awhole – may prove to be acrucial asset in emergingfrom the present crisis.Indeed, theconstruction-driven Spanishgrowth model isunsustainable: the morebalanced approach ofBarcelona and Cataloniamay indicate Spain’s futurepath.

A “back to basics”approach, in whichproductivity growth isdriven by competitiveindustries and services, isthe name of the game. Butit will not be without pain.In the short term,adjustment will be difficult

since credit is not flowingto industry due to thefinancial crisis, and thesmall and medium-sizeenterprise (SME) sectorpredominant in the largeBarcelona metropolitan areais very dependent on bankcredit.

Perhaps this should beseen as a blessing indisguise and provide animpetus for the overduerestructuring of the SMEsector, which needs toreform itself and toinnovate in order toincrease productivity.

Such a restructuring willsucceed only if there are noartificial impediments totransfers of resources fromdeclining to emergingsectors, and any industrialpolicy must be framed in away that allows privateenterprise to flourish. Thepressure of lower costproducers on an advancedindustrial area such asCatalonia, combined withthe Darwinian selectionthat the crisis will impose,should provide a crucialmomentum for neededproductivity improvement.

At the same time, animportant and sustainedeffort should be made toimprove human andtechnological capital. In thearea of advanced education,Barcelona is already leadingthe way internationally, inbusiness and economics, forexample. In research, animportant effort is beingmade in the biotechnologysector. Some firms intraditional sectors, such astextiles and food, and inservices, including utilitiesand banking, are alreadyvery competitiveinternationally.

A key asset of Barcelonato attract talent is itsquality of life, not only dueto climate and geography,but also because of thecity’s cultural and

architectural heritage. Thisshould serve to strengthentechnologically-advancedsectors in the area andpromote innovation. Forthis to happen, excellenceshould be put first,fragmentation avoided andthe public sector shouldtake the lead by supportingresearch and innovation ona competitive, open basis –and by decisively fosteringknowledge of English.

What else is needed?Barcelona and Catalonianeed a coherent regionalstrategy within Spain,Europe and the world thatbuilds on local strengthsand develops globalconnections. Barcelonaneeds to deepen its capacityto attract and keephighly-qualified

international professionals,embrace mobility, and serveas a development point andport of entry for new ideas,products and services.

Catering to all aspects ofquality of life andembracing a culture ofopenness will be keyelements of such a strategy.Barcelona should make themost of its largemetropolitan area to reacheconomies of scale whileallowing diversification andexperimentation withdifferent activities.

It is worth noting thatBarcelona violates theso-called Zipf’s law on thesize of cities, for accordingto this mathematicalformulation the size of thesecond city in a countryshould be half the size of

the first. Yet the size of theBarcelona metropolitan areais not far from that ofMadrid.

As for its strategiclocation, Barcelona has thecapacity to become theeconomic leader that willdrive the development ofthe existing MediterraneanEuroregion, a region with adevelopment modelprobably more resilientthan those of many otherEuropean Union regions.

Barcelona and itshinterland could be aneffective commercial,logistic and businessheadquarters centre for theregion, but for this tohappen crucial transportand communicationinfrastructure has to bedeveloped and political willapplied.

Barcelona and Cataloniahave lagged behind inpublic infrastructureinvestment for decades.Now an effort is beingmade with a new terminalin the airport, developmentof the port andmuch-needed investment incommuter trains. After acouple of decades ofimpressive growth of theMadrid area, the presentcrisis may bring about arebalancing, with increasedemphasis rightly given tothe Mediterranean axiswhere Barcelona is anatural leader.

The development of thisregional and internationalstrategy, however, will needappropriate financing andleadership that is bothoutward-looking andentrepreneurial.

Xavier Vives is professor ofeconomics and finance andco-director with PankajGhemawat of theCompetitiveness in Cataloniaproject at the Public-PrivateResearch Center, IeseBusiness School.

ViewpointXAVIER VIVES

Barcelona couldbecome theeconomic leader ofthe MediterraneanEuroregion

Barcelona’s big­hitters (clockwise fromtop left): Anna Veiga, Isidre Fainé, IsakAndic, José Montilla, Jordi Canals,Josep Ramoneda, Jaume Roures,Salvador Alemany AFP, Reuters

shortly after the dramatic election ofJosé Luis Rodríguez Zapatero’s firstgovernment in 2004, he wrote: “Mr Zap-atero must show that he can recoverthe active consensus that characterisedthe Spanish transition to democracythree decades ago.” Mr Zapatero wasre-elected last year, but – doubtless inpart because of the global economiccrisis – he seems a long way fromachieving that.

Jaume RouresIn politically polarised Spain, raisingthe hackles of both left and rightwingcommentators is not an easy feat –unless you are Jaume Roures. A jour-nalist by training, the former studentradical and social liberal who startedout in the media as a typesetter istoday both a hate figure of the rightand the bane of the establishment leftrepresented by media group Prisa. Hisown media group, Mediapro, took thebroadcast rights for Spain’s main foot-ball league off Prisa’s Channel Four; italso launched a breezy left-leaningdaily – Público – aimed at youngerreaders and in competition with Prisa’sheavyweight El País. Mr Roures, 58,has been in jail, hates wearing a tieand describes himself as “timid andintroverted”. But the company hechairs and part-owns is no quietachiever, its gleaming new Barcelonaheadquarters anchoring a “media city”cluster in the revitalised Poble Nou dis-trict. Mediapro produced Woody Allen’sVicky Cristina Barcelona, described bymany as the best bit of publicity for thecity since the 1992 Olympic Games.

Anna VeigaAnna Veiga, 52, stands out in the fieldsof assisted fertilisation and stem cellresearch, where Spain is at the fore-front of global research and techniques.A biology graduate of the AutonomousUniversity of Barcelona (UAB), shelater returned to the institution to doher doctorate degree. Her specialisation– human-assisted reproduction – hasbecome a forte of Spanish medicine,and thousands of couples travel to thecountry each year in the hope of find-ing a solution to problems of reproduc-tion. As well as being head of reproduc-tive medicine at Dexeus UniversityInstitute, Ms Veiga is director of thestem cell bank at Barcelona’s Centre ofRegenerative Medicine, and associateprofessor in the life sciences depart-ment at the Pompeu Fabra University.She was also the founder of the Span-ish Embryologists Society, and has sat,or sits, on numerous Spanish and Euro-pean scientific associations related toreproduction or regenerative medicine.

4 ★ FINANCIAL TIMES WEDNESDAY APRIL 29 2009

Doing Business in Barcelona

City seeks to make capital from location

Barcelona was not alwaysthe busy, multiculturalMediterranean city it istoday. In the Roman era,

it began life as an insignificantcollection of huts with an incon-veniently shallow harbour, over-shadowed by its southern neigh-bour Tarraco – now Tarragona –the walled capital of Rome’s His-pania Citerior.

Even after periods of prosper-ity – the spread of Aragon-Cata-lan influence and trade aroundthe Mediterranean in the lateMiddle Ages and the industrialrevolution of the 19th century –the inhabitants of Barcelona didnot always look to the sea.

“The sea, curiously enough,was almost inaccessible tothem,” wrote historian RobertHughes in his book Barcelona,describing the scene before thetransformational public worksthat preceded the city’s hostingof the Olympic Games in 1992.

“The city had sealed off its ownway of life from the sea by acluttered industrial port withscant marina facilities and thevirtual annihilation of any kindof social use of the coast that rannorth-east to the mouth of theBesós River.”

What a difference a decade ortwo can make. The commercialport is being expanded to meetthe needs of industry, butHughes’s “beaches fouled withindustrial effluents” and the“obsolete factories” and “dumps”that prevented access to themare now stretches of sand packedwith sunbathers, yacht marinasor offices and studios for high-tech companies.

Thus does Barcelona seek toplay the double role – as anattractive hub for both industryand services – needed to fulfil itsambition as “capital of the Medi-terranean” or, more awkwardlybut more expansively, as “theEuro-Mediterranean capital”.

Barcelona is content to leave toMadrid the role of Europe’s con-nection to Latin America, pro-vided it can capitalise on its own

advantages as a Mediterraneancentre, a link between Europeand North Africa and betweenEurope and Asia via the shippingroutes that pass through theSuez Canal.

City officials, and Miguel AngelMoratinos, Spain’s foreign minis-ter, were delighted when theirintense diplomatic efforts tosecure for Barcelona the seat ofthe new Union for the Mediterra-nean finally paid off in Novemberlast year.

The secretariat will be housedin the magnificent Palacio dePedralbes, and the authoritiesare also planning to invest €178mover eight years in restoring thepavilions of the Sant Pau districtacross town, which would pro-vide space for associated institu-tions.

Ignasi Cardelús Fontdevila,international relations directorfor the City of Barcelona, admitsthat the few dozen officials of thesecretariat are not in themselves

of huge economic significance,but says decisions will be takenand plans made for the spendingof billions of euros of EuropeanUnion investments in the Medi-terranean.

He is hoping to attract theMediterranean headquarters notonly of companies but of groupssuch as the World TourismOrganisation or the InternationalCommittee of the Red Cross. “Inthe end it’s as if a ministry of theEU planted itself in Barcelona,”

he says. “And we can use it as adraw for things that have no con-nection with the Mediterranean.”

Some are sceptical about Bar-celona’s perception of itself asthe capital of the Mediterranean.Jordi Vaquer i Fanés, director ofthe Centre for International Rela-tions and Development Studies(Cidob) in Barcelona, says thefact that large countries such asEgypt or Algeria might not agreerenders the whole idea of capital-idad “relatively empty” even if it

has any meaning in the firstplace.

He says: “No one will say thatNew York is the capital of theworld because it’s the seat of theUN.”

For Mr Vaquer, Barcelonawould do better to stop emphasis-ing capitalidad and focus on itsundoubted cultural and commer-cial advantages over other Medi-terranean cities. He notes thatBarcelona has been becomingmore multicultural at a time

when some of its rivals have seentheir multiculturalism decline.

It is the most Asian city inSpain, but there are also Moroc-cans, Senegalese, French andeastern Europeans on the streets.“What we can claim is that weare not Naples, Izmir, Tel Aviv orAlgiers – all of them woulddream of being Barcelona.

“At the same time, it’s a suc-cessful city in a globalisedworld,” he says. “It’s been a verydynamic economy, and comparedto the rest of Latin Europe, it’s arelatively open market.”

This openness is evident in thetraffic that passes through theport. The number of cruise pas-sengers grew 17 per cent lastyear, confirming Barcelona’splace as the Mediterranean’s topcruise destination, and could stayflat this year in spite of the glo-bal economic crisis, says JordiValls i Riera, chairman of thePort of Barcelona.

Vehicle exports and container

traffic (where Valencia hasrecently been a bigger force)have inevitably been badlyaffected by the fall in worldtrade. But Barcelona, with its eyeon the future, is pursuing a€3.5bn port expansion by publicand private investors and push-ing for construction of a freightrailway line from the port to theFrench border using the Euro-pean gauge (Spain’s is different).

In two years, container han-dling capacity will double to 5mTEU (20ft-equivalent units, astandard measure for containers)a year. By 2015, the new infra-structure will allow it to doubleagain if the demand is there.

“This will be the first time inhistory that Barcelona port doesnot have capacity problems,”says Mr Valls. With up to 17m ofwater depth at the quayside forthe bigger ships, it is all a far cryfrom the shallow, silted harbourthat plagued Barcelona’s com-mercial ambitions from Romantimes until the 19th century.

MARITIME LINKS

The Mediterraneanhas a more prominentrole than in the past,writes Victor Mallet

Intense diplomaticefforts to secure theseat of the new Unionfor the Mediterraneanpaid off last year

Steaming ahead: Barcelona port is pursuing a €3.5bn port expansion and pushing for construction of a freight railway line to the French border

‘Design publisher’ isshining success story

As a rule, Santa & Cole, theBarcelona design group,does not go out of its wayto get its products placed inmovie scenes.

If one of the company’lamps, chairs or parkbenches suddenly shows upin a film, it is normally bychance. However, when theart director on WoodyAllen’s Vicky CristinaBarcelona was scouting forideas ahead of filming lastyear, managing directorJuan Eusebio Pujol washappy to make a pitch.

“We showed them aselection of our products,”he said. “After all, it’s notevery day you get a chanceto play a role in a WoodyAllen film.”

Movie-goers with an eyefor design might havespotted the result of Santa& Cole’s promotionalenterprise: the kitchen ofthe character played byJavier Bardém isilluminated by anatmospheric fluorescentlamp suspended from theceiling. Noteworthy for itslength, warmth and sleekform, the light is a Flúor 07by Antoni Arola, one of theaward-winning localdesigners whose ideas aredeveloped by Santa & Cole.

Calling itself a “designpublisher”, Santa & Cole isa unique outfit even by themore avant garde standardsof Barcelona’s creativesectors. Founded in 1985 bya small group of designers,entrepreneurs and theirfamily and friends, thecompany edits andpublishes books aboutdesign and designers, butthis is more an aside than acentral part of the business.

Its focus, rather, is toselect concepts bydesigners, architects,interior decorators andlandscape gardeners,develop them technically,organise production througha network of specialistmanufacturers and storeand sell worldwide.

This process is what thecompany defines as“publishing” objects. It thenpays royalties on the sales,while protecting intellectualproperty rights.

The company’s register ofwhat it refers to as“authors” is a veritableWho’s Who of Catalan,Spanish and Europeandesigners and architects.Antoni Arola is just one ofits many stars. Its registeralso includes VicoMagistretti, Arne Jacobsen,Philippe Starck and MiguelMilá, the Spanish designmaster who, along with SirTerence Conran, receivedthe Compasso d’ Oro Awardin recognition of his careerlast year.

According to Mr Pujol,

Santa & Cole’s location nearBarcelona – in a convertedschool complex about 30kmnorth of the city – isanother of its assets.

“For a design-relatedcompany, Barcelona is agood place to be,” he says.“For fashion you haveMilan, and before, Paris;Barcelona is noted as acentre for industrial andinterior design.”

“When we tell peoplewhat we are doing, and thatwe are based in Barcelona,they have no trouble

making the connection.”Although its original

focus, when it was createdin 1985, was lighting, Santa& Cole has evolved into adiversified company withfour broad product lines:indoor elements such aslighting and furniture;outdoor elements, whichincludes urban lighting,benches, designer bicycleracks, waste bins, gardenenclosures, and other streetfeatures; trees; and books.Its catalogue also carriesupmarket kitchens andoffice furniture.

The umbrella term for allof this is “material culture”,which Santa & Cole definesas “a fine selection ofelements that surround us,and that bring somethingextra on top of form orfunction: serenity, cultureand well-being”.

Tree cultivation, whichcomplements itsfast-growing urbanfurniture business, is thecompany’s latest endeavour,and it currently has about aquarter of its 125-hectareParc de Belloch estateunder plantation.Landscaping and urbandesign, a resilient businessin times of crisis, currentlyaccounts for about 60 percent of sales, says Mr Pujol.

Despite modest turnoverof €35m, and a full-timestaff of 130, Santa & Cole isa genuinely globalcompany. Its interiordesigns are exported tomore than 35 countries, andit has representative officesand showrooms acrossEurope and the MiddleEast. Commissions for itsurban design operationincreasingly come fromoutside Spain.

If the company has anycomplaints about Barcelonaas a business centre, it isits relative isolation fromother places of commerce inEurope.

“It is important to havegood internationalconnections,” says Mr Pujol.

“I think the newinternational airportterminal will help here.”

“However, we only gotthe Ave (high-speed train)connection with Madrid ayear ago. We’d also like tohave this type of connectionwith the rest of Europe.”

CORPORATE PROFILESANTA & COLE

Mark Mulligan onan innovativebusiness model

Santa & Cole isunique even by thestandards ofBarcelona’screative sectors

Migrationfeeds cultureof growth

Vivek Malhotra is exactlythe kind of energetic scien-tist that Barcelona is eagerto attract in its drive to pro-mote itself as an interna-tional centre for biotechnol-ogy and biomedicine.

Mr Malhotra, an Indian-born American, moved toBarcelona last year from theUniversity of California, SanDiego to pursue researchinto the structure of humancells – and brought a team ofhalf a dozen experts withhim.

“I’m mostly interested inhow proteins are releasedfrom cells, and how cells arecompartmentalised,” he saysin his office in the airy andmodern seaside building ofthe Barcelona BiomedicalResearch Park (PRBB),where he heads the Centrefor Genome Regulation’s celland developmental biologyprogramme.

Despite decades ofresearch, the way cells actu-ally function is surprisinglylittle understood. Yet thetopic remains of obvious sig-nificance for human healthand the pharmaceuticalindustry. “It’s important foralmost everything,” says MrMalhotra.

He is among the scientistswho have migrated to Barce-lona in recent years becauseof its compelling combina-tion of government researchfunds and a pleasant life-style.

“The Catalans are a verytalented lot, but their talenthas always been in the areasof architecture, wine andfood – and they have beengreat in tourism. But unfor-tunately they have not madean impact in science,” hesays. “I think they wanted tostart this with a big bang.”

The PRBB – which was

opened three years ago nextto a university hospital bythe Catalan and Barcelonaauthorities and PompeuFabra University – hosts1,200 staff and researchersand is only one of severalpublic initiatives aimed atcreating a self-sustainingbiotech hub centred on Bar-celona.

Among the human andhardware resources adver-tised by the BioRegion ofCatalonia (Biocat), theregional biotech promotionauthority, are some ofSpain’s leading universitiesand hospitals, nine scienceand technology parks orzones and an establishedpharmaceutical industry.

There is also equipmentsuch as the MareNostrumsupercomputer and a syn-chrotron, a particle accelera-tor now under constructionnear Barcelona. The PRBBhas in its basement a mod-ern, robotised facility foranimals used in experi-ments, and currently has22,000 mice and 15,000zebrafish.

Despite its Roman Catho-lic heritage, Spain also hasthe attraction for scientistsof a relatively liberal atti-tude towards stem cellresearch.

Barcelona’s medical skillsand its international connec-tions were on display lastyear in a pioneering trans-plant of a “tissue-engi-neered” human airway forClaudia Castillo, a Colom-bian woman with breathingdifficulties, at the city’s Hos-pital Clínic.

Ms Castillo’s stem cellswere cultivated in Bristol,England and flown to Barce-lona, where they wereapplied to the “scaffold” of adonor’s trachea (previouslycleaned of the donor’s cells)in a device called a bioreac-tor, designed in Milan. Thehybrid trachea was then suc-cessfully transplanted – andnot rejected by Ms Castillo’simmune system because ithad been colonised with herown cells.

Barcelona, of course, is notthe only place trying to

become a biotech hub, andfaces intense competitionfrom other centres – as wellas the challenge of possiblepublic spending constraintsas a result of the global eco-nomic downturn.

It is hard to competeagainst rivals such as Cam-bridge in the UK or Flandersin Belgium, let alone US bio-tech powerhouses such asBoston, even if you advertisethe cultural and climatic

advantages of Barcelona’sMediterranean location.

“Of course half the planetwants to be in biotech,” saysJordi Camí i Morell, directorgeneral of the PRBB. “Scien-tists don’t move somewherefor aesthetic reasons or theclimate. There is good sci-ence in Minnesota which isfreezing cold . . . And thereare north Americans hereand they don’t come for thebeach.”

The challenges include thecomplexities of establishing

a company in Spain – a prob-lem not confined to the bio-tech sector – and the rela-tively small size of theregion’s 60 or so existingcompanies in pure biotech.Researchers and analystssay there is also a shortageof international financingdespite the existence of localfunds such as the €67m bio-tech fund launched by YsiosCapital Partners.

Above all, the region’sfast-growing biotech sectoris in a race to reach the sizeat which it can becomefinancially self-sustaining, sothat projects can movesmoothly from the researchstage – most Spanish biotechresearch and development isstill publicly-funded – tocommercial applications.

“We know our weaknessesand we are working to over-come them. They are not inexpertise, but in technologytransfer . . . the interfacebetween research and indus-try,” says Manel Balcells,who heads Biocat’s execu-tive committee. “There havebeen lots of [research]papers and few patents. Wedon’t need more researchcentres or hospitals, we needways of creating value.”

Núria Mas, an economistand assistant professor atIese business school who

studies the sector, suggeststhat one way to do thiswould be to put more focuson so-called “white” orindustrial biotech ratherthan the “red” medical bio-tech that currently accountsfor about 65 per cent of Cata-lonia’s efforts – becauseCatalonia has a big indus-trial base and “white” bio-tech tends to generatequicker commercial returns.

Biomedicine, however,looks set to remain at thecentre of Catalonia’s biotechpush.

At the PRBB, Mr Camísays it is essential to keepexpanding research and theinfrastructure supporting itin order to reach “criticalmass” before expecting sig-nificant commercial results.“We’ve made great progress,but from a very small base,”he says. “We are approach-ing the inflection point.”

In five years, concludesBiocat’s Dr Balcells, “we’llprobably be in a very com-petitive position with therest of Europe and the US, orsome centres in theUS . . . There’s a long way togo. But it’s on the politicalagenda of the Catalan andSpanish governments andthe European Union. Wewant to be a key city forEurope in this sector.”

BIOTECHNOLOGY

The cluster ismaking progressdespite havingpowerful rivals, saysVictor Mallet

Centre of excellence: Barcelona Biomedical Research Park

‘We don’t needmore researchcentres orhospitals, but waysof creating value’

Santa & Cole bicycle stands

FINANCIAL TIMES WEDNESDAY APRIL 29 2009 ★ 5

Doing Business in Barcelona

‘Gherkin’ brings extra f lavour

For anyone with a day ortwo to spare, and a desire totake in some of Europe’smost inspired architectureand interior and industrialdesign, Barcelona offers thedefinitive route.

Called, simply, the Barce-lona Design Tour, it takes in150 points of interest, andincludes hotels, bars and res-taurants, design centres anduniversities, architectonicfeatures, shops, fashionhouses and bookstores.

The list is far from com-plete: Antoni Gaudí’sSagrada Familia, the tower-ing cathedral to moderngothic design, is absent.However, other works byperhaps Barcelona’s mostfamous architect – namelythe undulatory Pedreraapartment block and nearbyCasa Batlló – are part of thetour, as are modern struc-tures such as the Hotel ME,and the Agbar tower, thecity’s own “gherkin build-ing” designed by Jean Nou-vel.

“Design is important toCatalonia, and even more soto Barcelona,” writes JordiMontaña, a director of thechair of design managementat the Esade business school.“Barcelona is a city thatlives with design. Its plazas,public spaces, bars, restau-rants and discos are, in gen-eral, well-designed and peo-ple like to identify withthis.”

The distinctive aestheticsof the city have helped makeit the most popular touristdestination in Spain, andone of the world’s favouriteweekend breaks. Longknown as a raffish port cityof architectural interest, itwas catapulted into the bigleague of global cities via the

much-designed and watched1992 Olympic Games, anevent that inspired a processof urban regeneration con-tinuing today.

While this in itself hasprovided work for thousandsof local, Spanish, and foreignarchitects, designers andurban landscapers, the city’ssudden visibility has alsohelped it go some waytowards becoming a hub forindustrial design.

Carmakers Volvo, Renault,Nissan and Subaru all have,or once had, design centresin or around Barcelona,while at Seat, the Spanishmarque controlled byVolkswagen, a team of 80designers dream up modelsfor the German group andits Audi and Bugatti brands.Hewlett-Packard, the UStechnology group,researches, designs anddevelops its large-formatprinters at a business parkjust outside the city, whileLego, the Danish toy maker,established a design studioin Barcelona in 2004.

In a report entitled “Barce-

lona, City of Design” ProfMontaña estimates thatthere are at least 8,000designers living and workingin Barcelona. The city is alsohome to an importantnumber of design academies– including the prestigiousElisava and Llotja schools ofdesign – offering a total of 80design-related degrees andtitles.

The fact that the Esade

business school even has aprofessorial chair of designmanagement, dedicated tostudying design in business,also reflects the importanceof the discipline to Barce-lona.

The city is also home toscores of design-focusedassociations, guilds andevents.

This fragmented networkis set to find a physical cen-tre at 22@Barcelona, theurban renewal project inBarcelona’s Poble Nou dis-trict. The city’s plannershave identified design as oneof five business clusters tobe developed.

The city council plans tobuild a Museum of Designnear the Agbar tower, whichwill bring together exhibitsfrom disparate museumsaround the city and encour-age industrial, interior andartistic designers to set upstudios in the district.

In some respects, the ideais to bring industrial designhome to its roots. Poble Nouwas a district of mills, foun-dries and machine shopswhen the industrial revolu-tion arrived in Catalonia,earning it the sobriquet ofthe “Manchester of Spain”.

And, according to histori-ans, Barcelona’s industrial-ists were the drivers of anew wave of Catalan product

design in the 18th and 19thcenturies.

Without a regional monar-chy to foster and patroniseartistic development, factoryowners turned to the city’sbourgeoisie to organiseschools of applicable artsand crafts.

The Barcelona Chamber ofCommerce complied, settingup the School of Noble Artsin the 18th century, whichgave rise to the Llotja – orchamber of learning andexchange – school of design.Industrial design flourishedin the 19th century and theearly 20th century, andnumerous guilds were estab-lished to protect and pro-mote new ideas. The worksof Gaudí and his later con-temporaries, including paint-ers such as Joan Miró andSalvador Dalí, only served toadd to Barcelona’s image ascity of artistic innovation.

“It was a chance for theCatalan bourgeoisies toshow off their artistic tradi-tion to the world,” says JordiBonet, chief architect on theSagrada Familia project.

After the Spanish CivilWar and the oppression ofthe Franco years, the citybegan to regain its promi-nence as an artistic centre inthe 1970s. Barcelona’s prepa-rations for the 1992 OlympicGames fostered a new waveof urban, product and mar-keting design, according toProf Montaña.

“It was a golden era dur-ing which powerful designteams were consolidated,” hewrites. “Designers becamepublic personalities, andtheir creations, popular.”

According to Josep MiquelPiqué, chief executive of22@Barcelona, the city’sfuture as a design hubdepends largely on how suc-cessfully it lures foreign tal-ent to its shores. The districthas already attracted a smat-tering of design studios andacademies.

“Design isn’t just aboutproducts,” he says. “It’s alsoabout having the right envi-ronment in which to be crea-tive.”

DESIGN

There is muchmore to Barcelonathan distinctivearchitecture, writesMark Mulligan

The city is home toscores ofdesign­focusedassociations, guildsand events

Carmakers are forced to shift down a gear

The travails of Nissanand Seat in the Bar-celona region help toillustrate how the

global motor industry hassuffered from the worldwiderecession – but also how thedownturn is rapidly obligingcarmakers to adapt to newenvironmental and economicconditions.

Nissan of Japan investedin its plant near the port atthe start of a 1980s drive toglobalise operations – itwent on to invest in the USand the UK – and tookadvantage of Barcelona’sstrategic position in south-ern Europe and the low costat that time of Spanishlabour.

Barcelona is as well-posi-tioned as ever, and althoughlabour costs have risen theyaccount for only a small partof what is now a capital-in-tensive industry. But themarket for the products thatNissan makes in Barcelonahas collapsed, forcing thecompany to lay off hundredsof workers.

“Total demand for vehiclesis down 20 to 30 per cent,”says Fumiaki Matsumoto,managing director of Nissan

Motor Ibérica and a vice-president of Nissan Europe.“But for our products it’sdown 50 per cent and at thismoment we cannot find bot-tom.”

According to Mr Mat-sumoto, the plant faced a tri-ple problem after the boomyears earlier in the decade.

First, it produces the Path-finder four-wheel drive vehi-cle and a mid-size van, bothwith large engines by Euro-pean standards (2.5 and 2.0litres). These were popularwhen economies were grow-ing fast. The vans, for exam-ple, were ideal for electri-cians and others who servedthe booming constructionindustry. “This boom is fin-ished,” says Mr Matsumoto.

Second, various countriesin Europe began introducingvehicle taxes linked to theiremissions of carbon dioxide,which again penalised vehi-cles with larger engines.

And third, financing forvehicle purchases – anessential element of themotor industry in most mar-kets – has dried up as theworld’s battered banks adopta more cautious approach togranting credit.

Nissan, 44 per cent ownedby France’s Renault, doesnot envisage expanding itsBarcelona workforce again,and believes it will eventu-ally need only 2,800 employ-ees compared with the 4,700it had in 2007 and the lessthan 4,000 working today.

Mr Matsumoto, however,sees light at the end of thetunnel for his plant aftersecuring agreement fromthree of the four tradeunions for a strategy of qual-ity improvement and costreduction through the sup-ply chain. By the end of thisyear, only eight months afterits launch in Japan, his oper-ation will start assemblingthe NV200, a new van with asmaller engine than theolder models made in Spain.

Seat, the Spanish vehiclecompany originally estab-lished with the help of

Italy’s Fiat in the Francoyears and now owned byVolkswagen, has also beenobliged to cut output at itshuge Martorell plant outsideBarcelona and temporarilylay off some of its 13,000local employees.

Yet the news is not allbad. Most of the productionis exported, and Germany’sincentives for scrapping oldcars have boosted sales inthat country of the smalland relatively clean SeatIbiza by 160 per cent, accord-ing to Ramón Paredes

Sánchez-Collado, Seat’s exec-utive vice-president forhuman resources.

Last week, furthermore,Volkswagen awarded themanufacturing of the newAudi Q3 compact sport util-ity vehicle to Martorell inpreference to other plants,an investment of €300m thatwill save 1,200 jobs.

The motor industry’simportance to Barcelona, asignificant shipping node toand from Asia via the SuezCanal, amounts to muchmore than the presence ofNissan and Seat. Hundredsof parts makers also havetheir bases in Catalonia.

Carmaking is a crucialpart of the city’s industrialheritage – it was in Barce-lona that the luxury His-pano-Suiza cars were madein the first half of the 20thcentury – and the belatedmodernisation of the globalindustry could contribute tothe upgrading of the localeconomy.

Companies in Spain havebeen no better than theirinternational peers at devel-oping a new generation ofelectric cars, despite theenthusiasm of the Spanishelectricity grid for car-charg-ing demand that would helpsoak up erratic supplies ofnight-time wind energy.

But Barcelona is knownfor art and design, includingcar design, and both Catalo-nia and Spain are eager toinvest in new technologies.

Seat alone employs 80designers and 1,000 researchand development staff inMartorell.

Mr Paredes says morethan 60 per cent of all theindustrial robots in Spainare in the modern Martorellfactory, which was opened in1993. Solar panels havealready been installed on theroof of the offices, and Seatplans to do the same withthe vast roofs of the factoryitself and the storage areafor new cars.

“Green” investment andthe drive for better produc-tivity will be crucial themesfor Barcelona’s industry andthe Spanish economy as awhole in the next few years.For managers, although per-haps not for workers ortrade unions, the crisis couldtherefore turn out to have asilver lining, forcing them toadapt to more cost-conciousand environmentally awaretimes.

“If it was just a question ofthe low cost of labour youwould have to close every-thing in Germany,” says Pro-fessor Pedro Nueno, a man-agement expert at the Iesebusiness school. “Some com-panies have taken the oppor-tunity to lay off people.Why? Because in this indus-try, even if you increase pro-duction, there is so muchprocess improvement thatyou can always automate abit more, you can alwaysrationalise.”

MOTOR INDUSTRY

Cuts at Nissan andSeat underline thesector’s importance,says Victor Mallet

‘Green’ investmentand the drive forbetter productivitywill be crucial in thenext few years

In the driving Seat: the VW unit’s Martorell plant Bloomberg

Big fish and minnows alikef lourish in smaller pond

In Barcelona’s fashionablePasseig de Grácia, there is atemple to the business modelof Inditex, one of Europe’smost successful clothesretailers.

Although based in Galicia,in Spain’s north-west, thecreator of the Zara fashionrange chose the country’smost stylish city to site oneof the biggest Zara-brandedstores in the world.

A magnet to tourists andlocals alike, the emblematic1,900 sq m outlet is alsoamong the world’s busiest,and one of only a few Zarashops with a Zara Home –which sells soft furnishings– incorporated inside.

To many visitors, a strollto the Passeig de Gràciaemporium to check out thelatest in Zara’s affordablecatwalk-inspired apparel ispart of the Barcelona experi-ence.

That many of Inditex’sother brands – namelystreetwear line Stradivarius,the smart Massimo Duttiand Bershka’s casual wearfor women – started life asCatalan companies shouldcome as little surprise.

Barcelona, and the region,has been a Spanish andEuropean reference for fash-ion design and marketing forthe better part of the pastfour decades. For centuriesbefore that, Catalonia’sindustrial valleys and townsturned out textiles for Spainand the rest of Europe.Although the region has,since the 1950s, lost much ofits textile production to low-cost centres such as Turkey,northern Africa, easternEurope and Asia, Barce-lona’s mild climate, funkystreet life and stylish ambi-

ence stay on as an inspira-tion to young designers.

Regular events, oftensponsored by the city andregional governments, pro-mote this image, whileendeavouring to help youngtalent. The city also lends itsname to fashion brands suchas Mango, sometimes knowas “the other Zara”, and theyouthful Custo.

A global trend-setter con-ceived in Barcelona, Mango’sfirst store was opened in thecity in 1984, also in the Pas-seig de Gràcia.

From humble beginningsselling imported jeans at aflea market in Barcelonaabout 30 years, Mangofounder Isak Andic todaypresides over a companywith sales of €1.4bn and apresence in 90 countries.

The son of Turkish immi-grants, his rise to promi-nence in the cut-throatworld of fashion retailinghas helped Barcelona consol-idate as a global reference inthe sector.

With its huge administra-tive headquarters, design

and logistics centre just out-side the Catalan capital,Mango is today Spain’s sec-ond largest textile and cloth-ing exporter, behind Inditex.

Custo, founded by Barcelo-na-born brothers Custo andDavid Dalmau, is anotherglobal brand intimately iden-tified with the Catalan capi-

tal. Inspired by the hippyand beach fashions of Cali-fornia in the 1970s and 1980s,the brothers started out sell-ing colourful T-shirts to thedomestic markets before cre-ating the “Custo Barcelona”brand in 1996.

Their flashy, colourfuldesigns caused a sensationat the 1997 New York Fash-ion Week, earning them afollowing among Hollywoodcelebrities such as Julia Rob-erts, Brad Pitt and ClaudiaSchiffer. Today, Custoderives more than 80 percent of its sales outsideSpain, and boasts about 3,000points of sale across theglobe.

“Barcelona will never beMilan, Paris or London,”says Paula Feferbaum, afashion designer who settledin the city from Brazil 16years ago. “But in manyrespects it is easier to getrecognised here and betaken seriously.”

Ms Feferbaum’s story istypical of scores of designersand retailers who have madeBarcelona their base. After astint working for Custo andother fashion houses, shelaunched her own successfulPaulinha Rio club wear linein the late 1990s.

From there she branchedinto fashion promotion,organising a series of eventsto showcase her work and

that of other young design-ers from Barcelona and else-where.

Called Circuit, her pro-gramme of events becamewell-known in Barcelona, asthey were often staged in thecity’s streets and squares, orin the lobbies of historicbuildings such as museums.The concept was finallyadopted by the municipaland regional governments,which have thrown theirpromotional muscle behindthe industry.

For years, Barcelonahosted the Bread&Buttertrade fair of urban fashionbrands, and will this yearlaunch the Brandery, a simi-lar event. Jordi Hereu, themayor of Barcelona,describes the new fair as a“personal project that wouldhelp Barcelona become a ref-erence point for interna-tional trade fairs in contem-porary fashion”.

Ms Feferbaum, meanwhile,is busy with Clarity, thecompany founded withbrother Paulo that special-ises in product launches andbranding, and includesamong its client list the likesof Nike, Swarovski, Maybell-ine, and L’Oréal.

“Basically, if you providethe platform, talent willflourish,” she says.

This space to create andbe seen has inspired scoresof others. Desigual, foundedby Swiss designer ThomasMeyer in the 1980s, isanother brand that has pros-pered in Barcelona. Afterstarting out selling hisdesigner T-shirts to club-goers in Ibiza, one of the Bal-earic Islands, Mr Meyer cantoday count on 50 own-brandstores, out of about 1,500points of sale across Europeand parts of Asia and theMiddle East.

“Barcelona inspires, and itis not stuffy and closed likeMilan or too competitive likeLondon and Paris,” says MsFeferbaum.

“Sometimes it’s morerewarding being a biggerfish in a smaller pond.”

FASHION

Barcelona is homefor young designersand well­knownbrands, writesMark Mulligan

Temple of fashion: Zara’s store in the Passeig de Grácia, one of the chain’s biggest outlets in the world

Paula Feferbaum: storytypical of many designers

Rising high: the Agbar tower

‘Barcelona inspires,and it is not stuffyand closed likeMilan or toocompetitive likeLondon and Paris’

6 ★ FINANCIAL TIMES WEDNESDAY APRIL 29 2009

Doing Business in Barcelona

CATALONIA

S PA I N

10 km

Manresa

Martorell

Terrassa

Vilafrancadel Penedès

Parc Natural de SantLlorenç del MuntI Serra de l’Obac

Monistrolde Montserrat

Parc Naturaldel Garraf

Parc Naturaldel Montseny

BA R C E LO N A

Mediterranean Sea

C-16

A-2

E-90

C-25

AP-7

C-58

B-20

LA BARCELONETA LES CORTS

SANTMARTÍ

‘More than aclub’ plays itsown game

On the face of it, there is noreason why Barcelona shouldhave the most popular footballclub in Europe.

The metropolitan area is onlythe continent’s ninth largest. FCBarcelona never had the readyforeign exposure of English clubssuch as Liverpool and Manches-ter United, which spread theirname partly though networksleft over from the British empire,such as the English language andthe BBC. On the contrary: duringthe decades that General Francoruled Spain, Barcelona waslargely closed off from the world.

Yet Barça (as FC Barcelona isknown) has about 44m Europeanfans, slightly more than RealMadrid or Manchester United,according to the marketresearchers Sport+Markt. Eventhat figure – almost equal to thepopulation of Spain – cannotquite convey the club’s prestige.Barça counted Pope John Paul IIas a member and has a museumthat outdraws the city’s PicassoMuseum. As Barça’s motto says,this is “more than a club”.

It is a status the club oweslargely to Catalan nationalism.“The unarmed army of Catalo-nia” is how Manuel VazquezMontalban, the local novelist,

described Barça. This club is“more than a club” becausemany Catalans support it as asort of psychological surrogatefor the state they do not have.And most of them appear happywith that arrangement.

Barça was founded in 1899, andfor most of its history Spain’scentralist rulers in Madrid weresuppressing Catalan nationalism.When the Catalan red-and-yellowflag and language were banned,Catalans often used Barça’s sym-bols instead. In the 1920s, localswaved the club’s blue-and-redflag in nationalist protestsagainst General Primo de Rivera,then Spain’s dictator.

From the late 1960s, as GeneralFranco’s rule waned, the bannedCatalan flag and language firstbegan re-emerging at Barcelona’sgames in the Nou Camp stadium.Many local fans at the timetreated Barcelona’s rival RealMadrid as emissaries of Madrid’sfascist regime. Lluis Flaquer, aleading sociologist in Barcelona,has said: “You couldn’t shout‘Franco, you murderer!’ on thestreet, so people shouted at RealMadrid players instead. It’s a psy-chological phenomenon: if youcan’t shout at your father, youshout at someone else.”

Catalonia gained significantautonomy after Franco died in1975. Nonetheless, Barça hasremained more than a club. JordiPunti, a Catalan novelist, says:“It’s not Franco anymore, butstill, when Barcelona play

Madrid it’s like Catalonia playingSpain.” Still, when Barcelona wina trophy, the players and localpoliticians traditionally show itto the crowds from the balcony ofthe Catalan government’s palaceon the Plaça Sant Jaume, andshout, “Visca el Barça, visca Cat-alunya!” – which, the nuances nodoubt lost in translation, means,“Barça wins, Catalonia wins.”

Barça’s president is elected –by the club’s 150,000 socios, ormembers – with as much fanfareas any president of Cataloniaitself. The incumbent, JoanLaporta, is a Catalan nationalistwho once co-founded a partyseeking independence fromSpain. He has even tried to getBarcelona’s foreign playersspeaking Catalan, albeit withlimited success: team talks areheld in Spanish.

But for all Laporta’s rhetoric,Barça no longer means quite asmuch as it did when other Cata-lan symbols were forbidden.Punti says Catalanism hasbecome less central to the club’sidentity. After all, when JoséLuis Rodríguez Zapatero, Spain’sprime minister, is himself aBarça fan, it becomes harder topresent the club as a resistancemovement against Spanish cen-tralism.

“Even the famous sentence‘More than a club’ in a certainway has become old-fashioned,”says Mr Punti. “This sentenceused to be around all the time,and now it’s not.” He believes theLaporta regime has tried to givenew meaning to “more than aclub” by recasting Barcelona as asort of global movement formorality. Whereas other clubshave sponsors’ names on theirshirt, Barcelona’s shirt advertisesUnicef. The club also aspires tolead the way in football’s battlewith racism.

Whatever “more than a club”means now, fans around theworld still respond to it. Barça’sgrandeur has always attractedforeigners. The club has 1,462penyes, or fan clubs, in countriesas varied as Cuba, Niger, andGuinea-Conakry. A member ofparliament in newly-independentKosovo says many Kosovarsincluding her own father supportBarça because they believe theclub stands for independence.

However, that is to misreadCatalanism as an independencemovement. For the most part, itis not that. While Kosovo andmany other European nationssmaller and poorer than Catalo-nia have gained independencesince the early 1990s, Cataloniahas stuck with Spain. Polls con-sistently show that only a minor-ity of Catalans want independ-ence.

Most inhabitants of Cataloniasay they feel at least partly Span-ish. Many of them want not astate, but some political auton-omy for Catalonia, and alsosomething vaguer than that:some symbols to show that Cata-lans are a separate people.

When Barcelona hosted theOlympics in 1992, many foreignobservers read the Catalan flagsthat draped the city as a demandfor independence. In fact theflags themselves were the point:Catalans wanted the symbols of anation. Chief among these sym-bols is FC Barcelona. That isprobably why – its beautiful foot-ball aside – Barça is the mostpopular club in Europe.

Simon Kuper is author of FootballAgainst the Enemy (Orion, £7.99).

FC BARCELONA

Simon Kuper on thespecial relationshipbetween Barça, itsglobal fan base,Catalonia and Spain

Offering a feast for the eyes

Since the days of CatalanGothic, Barcelona hasbeen the quintessentialcity of architecture, and it

would be hard to enjoy it to thefull without relishing the visualdelights of its buildings as muchas the taste of its Mediterraneanfood.

For the first-time visitor, thereare few better ways to absorbsomething of the city’s long his-tory than to lean back in a taxi,roll down the window and – care-fully ignoring the garish ground-floor shopfronts that couldbelong to any metropolis – studythe first and second floors of thebuildings as they pass.

From the medieval to the ultra-modern, from the conventional tothe very eccentric, almost everyarchitectural style and foible ison display just above the headsof the pedestrians: Mediterraneanbalconies; Haussmannien apart-ments; 20th century office tow-ers; bourgeois blocks commis-sioned by Catalonia’s wealthybut prudent capitalists who livedon the first floor above theirbusiness premises and rented outthe flats above; neo-classicism;art deco; art nouveau and mod-ernism. And, in particular, ofcourse, the work of AntoniGaudí, Barcelona’s most famousson.

“Gaudí was the greatest archi-tect and (many would say) thegreatest cultural figure of anykind that Catalunya had pro-duced since the Middle Ages,”wrote Robert Hughes in Barce-lona, his definitive and entertain-ing architectural and politicalhistory. “His work dominatesBarcelona as Bernini’s doesRome, setting a scale of imagina-tive effort against which one isapt to measure everything else.And most of his best buildingsare in or near the city.”

Gaudí’s best-known and most-visited work is the unfinishedand eternally controversialSagrada Familia church, whosedominant presence on the city

skyline is matched only by Bar-celona’s own 21st century gher-kin, Jean Nouvel’s Agbar Tower.

The style of Gaudí, a devoutCatholic who was obsessed bytrees and other natural formsand by complex geometric trans-formations, is almost impossibleto describe, though Hughes madea bold effort. “The surfaces twistand undulate; the space wriggles,flares, solemnly inflates, andthen collapses again. It is haptic,not abstract, a womb with aview.”

Like Barcelona or any greatcity, and like a medieval cathe-dral, the Sagrada Familia is awork in progress. George Orwell,who was in hiding in faction-rid-den Barcelona after fighting onthe Republican side in the 1936-39

Civil War, memorably describedit as “one of the most hideousbuildings in the world”, said thespires looked like hock bottlesand lamented the bad taste of therampaging anarchists in notblowing it up when they had thechance.

Yet it is still being built, morethan a century after the firststone was laid in 1882. JordiBonet, the octogenarian chiefarchitect in charge of the project,is almost as controversial asGaudí himself – Hughes is scath-ing about his attempts to inter-pret Gaudí´s intentions – buteven after 25 years on the job hebubbles with enthusiasm about aman once described by a papalnuncio as the Dante of architec-ture.

By September next year, saysMr Bonet, the walls of theextraordinary building that iscurrently more building site andtourist attraction than churchwill be finished, though muchwork remains to be done over thenext decade on new towers andupper structures. Instead of occa-sional services for 600 people in acorner of the edifice, it will bepossible regularly to celebratemass in a place designed to holdup to 10,000 worshippers.

“The Gaudí idea was that thenaves of the church will be as aforest, and the light will comefrom above as in a forest,” saidMr Bonet, who seeks to connectthe start of the work in the 19thcentury with its sporadic contin-uation in the 20th and its hoped-

for completion in the 21st. “It is awork spanning the centuries. Weare already in the third.”

Although Gaudí helped defineBarcelona’s very particular lookand feel, his is not the only showin town. For lovers of architec-ture and design in all its forms,the city offers a feast for theeyes.

Modernist painter PabloPicasso, although from Malaga,became an adopted son of Barce-lona, and the museum dedicatedto his life and works has becomeanother of the city’s most-visitedattractions. Located in the atmos-pheric Montcada street, in thetrendy Born district, the museumis spread along a series of gothictownhouses, and is rarely seenwithout student and tour groupsand assorted travellers queuingoutside.

While few would doubt thatPicasso was inspired by the con-voluted neo-Gothic shapes ofGaudí, the architect himself drewa lot of his inspiration from themedieval masters of CatalanGothic, a style that is consideredto be more austere and to placemore emphasis on the horizontalthan the broader EuropeanGothic.

One of the finest examples ofthis architectural style is theBasílica Santa María del Mar, oneof Barcelona’s four showcasechurches, also in the Born neigh-bourhood.

Designed by architects Beren-guer de Montagut and RamonDespuig, the unusually austerestructure has, for centuries, beenassociated with seafaring folkand others from the labouringclasses.

Compared with the SagradaFamilia, it was erected relativelyquickly, between 1329 and 1383,as “according to the chronicles,most of the able-bodied popula-tion of Barcelona worked on it”,according to Hughes. It has sinceendured everything from earth-quakes and fires to mob sackingduring the Spanish Civil War.

“Inside, the scale is immense,”writes Hughes. “There is nogrander or more solemn architec-tural space in Spain than SantaMaría del Mar.”

Only the admirers of AntoniGaudí who queue each day out-side the Sagrada Familia maybeg to differ.

VISITORS’ GUIDE

Victor Mallet andMark Mulligan payhomage to the city’smany delights

Work in progress: the eternally controversial Sagrada Familia church is still being built, more than a century after the first stone was laid in 1882 Dreamstime

Whereas other clubshave sponsors’ nameson their shirt,Barcelona’s shirtadvertises Unicef