The definitive transformation of the Model, which continues in the offices, takes another step to see the light. 2027 is the date set to have the first phase completed. To get there, a tender will be put out in April, for a value of 1.3 million euros, for the drafting of the executive projects for this package, which includes 15,800 square meters of roof spread between the Xirinacs high school, a sports center and the space dedicated to the memory of the old prison, in addition to an energy plant that will power the whole complex. Barcelona City Council’s forecast is for the works to begin in 2025.
In a second phase, subsidized housing will be built – 121 have been planned -, the nursery school and centers for young people and social and solidarity economy. The councilor of the Eixample, Pau Gonzàlez, yesterday avoided putting a date on this part of the recovery of the Model and limited himself to saying that the works “will be concatenated” with the previous ones. In September, the municipal government pointed out that it could be ready in 2028. The third and last piece will be a residence for the elderly, which depends on the Generalitat and also has no – and had no – execution plans. Each area that is transformed will include the urbanization, with a predominance of green, of the adjacent public spaces.
With regard to the first phase that is now activated, the main innovation, presented yesterday, is that all – and not just a part – of the fourth gallery of the old prison, the one most linked to political prisoners, will be preserved, to allocate – her in the memorial space. Thus, the central and most characteristic body of the prison, which dates from 1904, will extend over the three floors and part of the panopticon. In total, this area will have 5,800 m2. The drafting of this project has an estimated cost of 300,000 euros.
The Democràtica council, headed by Jordi Rabassa, has worked on the definition of the project with experts and local and specialized organizations and has analyzed the experiences of old prisons that have been turned into museums in Europe and America. “It is an emblematic building and a monument full of very diverse experiences, life stories and memories”, emphasized the councilor. His intention is to form a “triad” with Born and the police prefecture of Via Laietana, which he hopes to incorporate in the coming years as a public space. Thus, he predicted, “Barcelona will be at the forefront of public memory policies regarding the treatment of heritage and the same discipline of democratic and collective memory”.
On the ground floor there will be ten themed cells that will allow a journey from the beginning of the penitentiary system (the prisons of the old regime, represented in Barcelona by Reina Amàlia) to the achievement of the new penal paradigm (the prison Model, which was replicated in several cities), going through the Second World War, the Civil War and Franco’s repression. We will also remember the centers for women, the labor and social conflicts, the prison strikes, the repression of the LGBTI group and the gypsies… And, in addition, what this penitentiary center represented for the growth of the Catalan capital.
Another novelty is that the gypsy chapel, the work of the artist Helios Gómez, on the first floor will be restored. The memory space project will also include a multipurpose space on the -1 floor to exhibit pictorial, sculptural and audiovisual works. Likewise, other areas of the site, outside the fourth gallery and the panopticon, will reflect the tangible and intangible heritage vestiges of the Model’s past.
Since it is in the same area, the southwest, where the workshops were, between Nicaragua, Provence and Rosselló streets, the Xirinacs high school, the sports center and the power plant will share the project. The drafting of this project will cost one million euros. Gonzàlez emphasized that the City Council and the Generalitat have agreed to advance the deadlines of the first through the Education Consortium, with municipal funding. The idea is that the 2027-2028 academic year will begin with the new facilities ready. Of the 10,000 m2 of the piece, about 5,500 m2 will be for the educational center, which will have two lines; 2,800 m2, for the sports equipment, and 1,600 m2, for the energy plant, which will generate cold and heat through geothermal and aerothermal throughout the site.
