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Barcelona 2026: a year to rethink architecture as a cultural and social engine
More than 1,500 activities throughout the city and the region will turn Barcelona into the world capital of architectural debate, with a collective, multidisciplinary program open to all citizens.
Between February 12 and December 13, 2026, Barcelona will become the setting for an extraordinary year dedicated to architecture, with a wide-ranging multidisciplinary program. More than 1,500 activities, distributed across the city's ten districts and extending throughout the territory, will invite citizens to rediscover architecture as a cultural, social and transformative practice.
Framed under the label Barcelona 2026, World Capital of Architecture, the project aims to vindicate the capacity of architecture to influence everyday life and, at the same time, project the historical and contemporary heritage of the city and the talent of Catalan architecture internationally. The initiative is co-financed by Barcelona City Council, the Generalitat de Catalunya and the Ministry of Housing and Urban Agenda of the Government of Spain.
One of the highlights of the year will be the celebration of the UIA World Congress of Architects, scheduled for 28 June to 2 July 2026. However, the essence of the project lies in its collective nature: a proposal built from the bottom up based on the contributions of 170 entities from the architectural, cultural and educational fabric. From this shared process, more than 200 projects have emerged that are deployed in a constellation of diverse activities.
Urban routes and guided tours, workshops, debates, conferences, exhibitions and contemporary cultural actions —with the presence of dance, music, theatre and cinema— make up an open, plural and dynamic programme, aimed at both the general public and professionals and educational communities. The project has the support of strategic partners such as CATEB, COAC, ArquinFAD, Construmat–Fira Barcelona and 48h Open House Barcelona, as well as all university centres linked to architecture, urban planning, landscaping and spatial design. The result is a choral and multifaceted proposal that consolidates Barcelona as a central node of contemporary architectural and cultural debate.
In numbers, the program includes 143 exhibitions, more than 500 routes and guided tours, 300 debates and conferences, 140 workshops and nearly sixty activities that connect architecture with other artistic disciplines. In parallel, the educational program will promote more than 600 workshops for children and young people, with initiatives such as "Architecture in the Classrooms", which brings architects to educational centers, and "The City We Want", a participatory project in which students from all districts imagine and design the Barcelona of the future.
