The town of Vilassar de Mar (Maresme) has mobilized to save from the demolition decreed by the Ministry for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge (Miteco) the iconic building of the Palomares restaurant, on Almadrava beach, in compliance with an inflexible and renewed Costes law. In the first instance, the City Council, as reported by its mayor, Damià del Clot, will promote the necessary administrative measures to stop the demolition of the building, decreed for May 13. “We will do the impossible”, says the batlle. Initially, they will try to do so by declaring the property a property of local interest (BCIL) and will urge to extend protection with a cultural property of national interest (BCIN), for which they need the involvement of the Generalitat.
Both the City Council and the Bricbarca entity, engine of nautical activities in the municipality, and the nautical studies center of Vilassar de Mar, whose spokesperson is the dean of the Faculty of Nautical Sciences of Barcelona, ??the tireless preserver of the nautical culture Agustí Martín Mallofré, promote a great cultural project to protect the Palomares building, although the restoration activity will soon cease after the concessions that have been held since 1960 have been exhausted.
This same week political and civil society representatives from Vilassar will go to the headquarters of Miteco to present the great cultural project that will have as one of its axes the Palomares building, the Almadrava Maritime Interpretation and Activation Centre. It is, according to Agustí Martín, an innovative interpretation center that would be based in the emblematic building. “We can save it if we convert it into a public space”, in this case cultural and sporting.
The center will be a point of cultural activity that, apart from recovering the historical memory of the almadraves, provides for a workshop of masters of aixa, the great riverside artisans who built the wooden boats that established themselves during the last century on the Catalan coast.
The Palomares would be one of the four projected vertices, along with the Naval Museum, which has an eminent collection of nautical objects; the Escola Nàutica, with its imposing headquarters on Carrer Trafalgar could be the museum space dedicated to the 19th century Catalan navy, and the historic bathing houses on the Garbí breakwater, also under threat.
If the ministry agrees to preserve the building on the condition that it be used for cultural and sporting purposes, Vilassar de Mar could have new spaces dedicated to the culture of the sea. The Palomares would be the great cultural center, with classrooms, conference rooms and equipment for organizations. On the ground floor of the building, at the foot of the beach, the popular nautical boats would be located, such as traditional Llagutsi boats, even old boats to be repaired in the courses of the local masters.
The center would host the Universitat d’Estiu de Mar i Ultramar – which has already held 17 editions – and activities such as the Universitataria de la Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC). It would have facilities for doctoral students in Marine Sciences or spaces for final degree or master’s students and also for local schoolchildren who are already “studying how to build their own boat”.
The promoters of the initiative have established agreements with various entities to guarantee the necessary boost to the initiative that would avoid Palomares. Therefore, entities such as the Maritime Museum of Barcelona, ??the Nautical Faculty, the Institute of Marine Sciences, the CSIC or the Fundació Cousteau de l’Estartit, would have shown their interest in collaborating.