With ham by Enrique Tomás, cocktails by Javier de las Muelas, cake by Christian Escribà, music by Marco Mezquida and the surprise appearance of Estopa, Casa Seat celebrated its third anniversary in a big way last night. The numbers consolidate this space as a benchmark for cultural activity in Barcelona that unites mobility, music, design, literature, dialogue and trends. In these three years, Casa Seat has covered 700 events that have been followed by 450,000 people on site. Yesterday, 250 guests toasted the future of this strategic space.
The celebration was attended by the president of Seat, Wayne Griffiths, who highlighted the implementation and importance of this place in the city and the future of mobility, as well as his commitment to electrification. Griffiths asked for a stable and business-friendly municipal government in front of an audience where there were, among others, Xavier Trias, Ernest Maragall, Jaume Collboni and Daniel Sirera, who, four days before the constitution of the new City Council, had a moment to converse
“We want to democratize electric mobility”, insisted Griffiths, who asked for support for this type of vehicle “and not to demonize the electric car”, he added. Seat’s commitment to the city is proven with the two Cupra models named after Barcelona neighborhoods: Born and Raval.
The third anniversary also coincides with a full stop in the direction of Casa Seat. It was the same president who announced that Gabriele Palma, the figure who imagined and conceived the project a year and a half before its opening to the public – quite an event in June 2020, at a time of restrictions for the pandemic –, leaves office. His successor will be Cristina Vall-Llosada, until now responsible for corporate communication. “The identity, the concept of Casa Seat, will not change, although decisions are made every day and the new management will make theirs”, said Palma, satisfied and grateful for the balance of these first three years of life space.
Gabriele Palma took stock of this year’s activity, a total of 250 events held over the past twelve months, including conferences, dialogues, exhibitions and guided tours or the Objective Barcelona cycle, organized by La Vanguardia and Barcelona Global and by which the mayors of all the parties with representation in the City Council passed.
The Barcelona Film Fest has also taken place at Casa Seat, literary cafés, storytellers have been held there and new products from Seat and Cupra have been presented. From Els Amics de les Arts to Stay Homas, Gonzalo del Val, Judit Neddermann, Fëdor Veselov or Joan Dausà have passed through here this year. Experts in mobility, technology and cities have also met in the event hall of this building, which has been the scene of literary cafés and numerous exhibitions.
Yesterday, after the interventions of Wayne Griffiths and Gabriele Palma, Marco Mezquida performed and, outside the announced script, the Estopas made an appearance, with two songs and one more at the public’s request. This year’s 250 acts are added to last year’s 225, which had 200,000 spectators and musical dates with Rosario Flores, Álvaro Soler or Rodrigo Cuevas.
