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The current Hotel Bagués and restaurant El Regulador has its origins in a building built in 1848 for Francisco Piña at Rambla de las Flores number 37 corner with Calle Carmen.
It was built by the cabinetmaker and later architect Josep Fonserré i Doménech, who, in 1851, asked the City Council to lower the floor of the old fishmonger’s shop to make the stairs located in front of the Belén church disappear.
Francisco Piña had hired Josep Fontserè i Domènech to build a classic five-story building, with a romantic style and dedicate the property to individual rental.
Fontserè built a façade divided into three sections. On the ground floor he had designed stone-paneled semicircular doors for the commercial premises and a straight-line entrance door as access to the building.
On the first and second floors he designed Ionic pilasters that contrasted with the pink stucco of the rest of the façade.
The two upper floors were separated by a cornice, as if they had been designed later. In this part the pilasters were replaced by sculptural groups with children’s images made of terracotta.
In 1895, the jeweler Joan Boix, a resident of the building since 1883, rented the basement of the building and after a major renovation bordering on a very ornate style, he opened the premises as the new jewelry and watch shop El Regulador.
Such was the low acceptance of the exterior decoration of the building by the citizens that, in 1910, the architect Josep Bori and the decorator Salvador Alarma redesigned the jewelry store, giving it a more elegant air with a modernist style decoration that earned the distinction of the City Hall in the awards granted in 1911. Unfortunately, during the pre-war period the decoration was destroyed and looted by groups of anarchists.
In 1948, the store was acquired by the Bagués jewelry store (founded in 1917), owned by the brothers Narcís and Amadeu Bagués. Later, in 1955, they carried out a renovation, leaving the lower part of the façade as the builder had designed them.
The jewelry underwent a small external change that was the result of many legends during its existence.
The Bagués patriarch, a person with a commercial spirit, thought that to attract future customers he should have attractive storefronts. The solution was very simple, he decided to place a red scale at the entrance that led to Calle del Carmen so he could weigh for free. This would mean that people passing by on their way to La Boquería could even check the weight of the purchase.
The Scale was from the SAA brand, it was manufactured on November 30, 1948 with patent number 137354, it was made of industrial-type iron and painted in dark red with measurements of 1.70 meters high and 0.50 meters wide. .
The legends of its use were as a consequence of being able to check if they had been deceived by merchants regarding the weight of a product. From there a thousand and one different stories emerged.
In 2010 the building was sold to the Derby Hotels Collection company which, after a comprehensive restoration, inaugurated the 5-star Bagués hotel. The restorers, however, continued to preserve much of the building’s elements.
In the decoration of each of the 31 rooms they included pieces from the Masriera collection that turned them into small museums. On the first floor of the hotel they built a room converted into the Masriera Museum Room.
The Scale, manufactured for the El Regulador jewelry store, is currently located in the Mercat de la Boqueria offices.
