Barcelona, barri a barri A living atlas of the 73 neighbourhoods
Menu

Sant Martí · 68

el Poblenou

Poblenou was market garden, wetland, workers’ district, “Catalan Manchester”, industrial beach and factory-reuse laboratory before it became a creative-city brand. Its value lies in the difficult coexistence of the Rambla, popular housing, factories, cemetery, workshops, artists, technology and neighbourhood life.[1][2]

Stand on the Rambla and look sideways. The civic axis appears orderly; behind it are passages, industrial plots, narrow houses and sheds. The contrast between public promenade and productive interior is one of Poblenou’s reading keys.

Poblenou formed in the nineteenth century on Sant Martí’s low land, near the sea and beyond the walled city’s restrictions. Industry, railway and workers’ housing expanded so intensely that the sector became the “Catalan Manchester”. The Rambla and Marià Aguiló organised markets, cooperatives, athenaeums and clubs.

Deindustrialisation left empty factories, unemployment and disputed land. Artists and workshops entered some spaces in the 1990s; from 2000, 22@ accelerated offices, housing, campuses and investment. The present is a negotiation over what survives and who can remain.

Where the name comes from

Nineteenth-century sources use Pueblo Nuevo / Poble Nou for the new concentration south of Sant Martí, also connected with the Taulat. It was new relative to older rural and parish centres, not built on empty land.[1][2]

Distinguish the historical Poblenou, today’s administrative neighbourhood and the much larger territory marketed under the name.[1][2]

A Sant Martí neighbourhood between Diagonal, the coast, the Olympic Village and other wider-Poblenou fabrics. The 2006 polygon does not fully match memory of “industrial Poblenou”.[1][2]

Before the neighbourhood

Wetlands, lagoons, gardens, pasture, farmhouses, routes and a working coast preceded dense urbanisation. Water supported cultivation and some industries while also bringing flooding and poor sanitation.[1][2]

Sea access, cheaper land and water encouraged bleaching, printing, textiles, metalwork, food production and storage. Industry reorganised an existing productive landscape.[1][2]

How the streets were made

The Rambla became a civic promenade between factory and housing. Marià Aguiló, Pere IV and Taulat linked trade, transport and labour. Narrow passages and low homes coexisted with factories covering whole blocks.[1][2]

Cerdà’s grid arrived unevenly. 22@ has opened interiors and rebuilt streets, but also raised development capacity, land values and pressure on low-cost production.[1][2]

Dates that changed it

  1. 1819: the modern Poblenou cemetery opens; verify earlier phases.[1]
  2. 1840s–1850s: Pueblo Nuevo/Poble Nou appears in sources.[1][2]
  3. Later nineteenth century: industrial and workers’ expansion.[3]
  4. 1856–1885: development of Can Felipa.
  5. 1858–1884: Can Saladrigas grows.
  6. 1897: Sant Martí is annexed.
  7. 1960s–1980s: closures and industrial job loss.
  8. 1989–1991: pool and civic centre open at Can Felipa after campaigning.
  9. 2000: 22@ framework approved.
  10. 2022: 22@2022 enters force; distinguish targets from delivery.
  11. 2022: 22@2022 enters force; distinguish targets from delivery.

People and collective life

Textile and metal workers, railway staff, dyers, bleachers, carters, dockers, fishers, shopkeepers and tenants made Poblenou. Women worked in factories, washing, sewing, food, shops, domestic service and care, often missing from company histories.

Cooperatives, choirs, athenaeums, parishes, clubs, festivals and resident groups created a dense public sphere. Artists, migrants, students, designers and technology workers came later; they did not discover a culturally empty district.

Artists in naves (1990s–2000s)

Interim uses of empty sheds: workshops, studios and cultural life before full reconversion.

Tech workers

Current productive layer of 22@ and knowledge services.

People behind the buildings

Can Felipa is associated with Felipe Ferrando and successive textile firms, but also with its workers and the campaign for public use. Can Saladrigas bears Antoni Saladrigas’s name; its surviving 1884 hall is attributed to engineer Francisco Pasqual.[4][3]

The library remembers teacher and local-memory activist Manuel Arranz. In the new economy, cleaners, security staff, couriers, technicians and maintainers are equally structural.

Institutions

Carrer del Marroc / Emília Coranty

The Rambla, market, Can Felipa, Manuel Arranz Library, cemetery, schools, healthcare, athenaeums, shops and beach form the local system. Every reused factory should state both its current function and former production.[4][3]

Rambla del Poblenou

The cemetery is an artistic and social archive but also a place of grief; provide respectful visiting rules, access and current hours.[1]

Rambla del Poblenou

Social spine

Can Felipa / civic centres

Community

Factory cultural centres

Heritage reuse

Cemetery of Poblenou

Memory landscape

Struggles that left a mark

Demand: Campaigns for Can Felipa, industrial heritage, Can Ricart, housing, facilities and productive land shaped the district. Façade preservation often failed to preserve employment or affordability.[3][4]

Outcome: In 2023 the complex was still described as heritage “languishing” while 22@ advanced. Later status must be documented with later dated sources.[3]

Demand: Current disputes concern rents, hotels, student housing, offices, noise, shops and ground-floor use. Ask what forms of life heritage policy enables.

Outcome: Ongoing: reconversion, housing and productive uses remain in tension.

Tourism growth

Demand: Resident balance and everyday neighbourhood uses.

Outcome: Rising issue: housing, public space and industrial-cultural tourism.

What can still be seen

Marroc 17-67 / Emília Coranty 5-37

The Rambla, Marià Aguiló, passages, low houses, Can Felipa, Can Saladrigas, chimneys, sheds and cemetery reveal different layers. Look for loading doors, saw-tooth roofs, wide structures and company names.[4][3]

Rambla del Poblenou

Walls do not explain themselves. Add processes, power, noise, shifts, accidents, pay and conflict.[1]

Chimneys kept as monuments

Selective industrial memory

Cemetery of Poblenou

19th-c. city of the dead

What disappeared

Wetlands, gardens, working beaches, hundreds of factories and workshops, homes, trades and labour networks disappeared. A factory can also vanish socially when its shell survives but affordable production does not.[1][2]

Record companies, displacement, contamination and family memory, not only surviving monuments.

Many chimneys

Demolished; a few remain as monuments.

The neighbourhood today

In 2026 Poblenou had 34,736 residents, 221.7 residents per hectare, a mean census-section income of €27,093 in 2023, 156.7 hectares, and 27.1% of residents held non-Spanish nationality.[1][2]

Averages combine the Rambla, waterfront, older housing, new development and transformation areas. Disaggregate income, tenure, age, origin, prices, heat and access to services.[1][2]

Non-Spanish nationality (2026): 27.1%

What is changing

22@Barcelona plan (since 2000)

22@ continues adding offices, homes, universities and public space at uneven speeds. The 2022 revision promises affordable housing, compatible production and green space; land secured, homes delivered and facilities opened reveal implementation. Rambla commerce, workshops, rents, student residences, vacant plots, heritage and trees continue to change.[1][2]

Can Ricart — heritage and pending renewal (2023 status)

Listed printing complex that in 2023 still awaited a coherent renewal project as 22@ advanced around it. Any later use (campus, housing) must be dated with later sources.[3][4]

What the guides leave out

They jump from “Catalan Manchester” to startups. They omit crises, unemployment, artistic occupation, property struggle, women's work and neighborhood organization.[1][2]

They also confuse the administrative neighborhood and the historic Poblenou.

Cemetery by the beach city

Two Poblenous on one plan: industrial/funerary memory and waterfront economy.

Read it on foot

Start: Metro L4 Poblenou / tram T4 · End: Can Ricart (Marroc / Emília Coranty)

Walking (excluding stop time): 46 min · 3420 m · Estimated visit (with stops): 46 min

The geometry follows the pedestrian network between the three marked points, but it has not been verified as step-free. Check access conditions, works and opening hours before setting out. The approach from public transport is not included in the stated distance.

1
Rambla del Poblenou
Rambla del Poblenou 23
Tree-lined promenade with terraces and local shops[1]
Civic spine articulating residential Poblenou before the shed lands.[1]
41.39916, 2.20358
2
Carrer de Marià Aguiló / teixit de cases
Carrer de Llull 218 - 220
leg: 450 m · 6 min
Tenements and shops of pre-22@ fabric[1]
Worker housing and neighbourhood shops are as much “Catalan Manchester” as the factory.[1]
41.40211, 2.20381
3
Can Ricart
Carrer de Pere IV 262
leg: 590 m · 8 min
Sheds and volumes of the textile-printing complex[4][3]
Industrial heritage under 22@ pressure and gaps; in 2023 a coherent renewal was still awaited.[3]
41.40590, 2.20039
4
Rambla
Ronda Litoral (Besòs) 74
leg: 1490 m · 20 min
Cafés and trees
Town spine
41.39623, 2.20748
5
Factory nave/chimney
Ronda Litoral (Llobregat) 76
leg: 240 m · 3 min
Brick
Industrial city
41.39503, 2.20566
6
Toward cemetery wall
Carrer del Taulat 21
leg: 650 m · 9 min
Wall
Memory city
41.39628, 2.20169

Sources for this page

Dates, figures and historical claims are linked to the records used for this page.

  1. [1] Daniel Paül i Agustí (2014). De Manchester català a districte de la innovació. Els canvis urbanístics al Poblenou. Type: scholarly_paper. Locator: text: any 2000 Ajuntament emprèn transformació de l’antiga àrea industrial del Poblenou en districte de la innovació (22@). Accessed: 2026-07-16.
  2. [2] 22@Barcelona / District Energy Award materials (2011). 22@. Sant Martí District. Barcelona Public-private enterprise. Type: municipal_project. Locator: p. on 22@Barcelona plan approval in 2000; Poblenou industrial area infrastructure. Accessed: 2026-07-16.
  3. [3] 3CatInfo (2023-02-05). Can Ricart, un conjunt patrimonial que llangueix enmig de la transformació del 22@. Type: news_report. Locator: reportatge 05/02/2023: Can Ricart patrimoni; espera projecte de renovació mentre creix el 22@; catalogació alta. Accessed: 2026-07-16.
  4. [4] Pobles de Catalunya (n.d.). Can Ricart (Barcelona | Provençals del Poblenou). Type: heritage_site. Locator: fitxa Can Ricart: Marroc 17-67 / Emília Coranty 5-37; estampació tèxtil; Josep Oriol Bernadet. Accessed: 2026-07-16.
  5. [5] Ajuntament de Barcelona — CartoBCN (2006+). Unitats administratives de la ciutat de Barcelona — límits de barris. Type: cartography. Locator: cartobcn-barris. Accessed: 2026-07-17.
  6. [6] Ajuntament de Barcelona (2006). Nova divisió territorial de Barcelona en districtes i barris. Type: municipal_reference. Locator: divisio-2006. Accessed: 2026-07-17.
  7. [7] Ajuntament de Barcelona — Open Data BCN (2026-01-01). Padró municipal d'habitants (pad_mdbas) — població per barri. Type: statistical_dataset. Locator: pad-sexe-2026. Accessed: 2026-07-17.
  8. [8] Ajuntament de Barcelona — Open Data BCN (2021). Densitat de població per barri. Type: statistical_dataset. Locator: densitat-2021. Accessed: 2026-07-17.
  9. [9] Ajuntament de Barcelona — Open Data BCN (2023). Renda disponible de les llars per persona. Seccions censals. Type: statistical_dataset. Locator: renda-2023. Accessed: 2026-07-17.
  10. [10] Ajuntament de Barcelona — Open Data BCN (2026-01-01). Població per nacionalitat i sexe. Barris. Type: statistical_dataset. Locator: pad-nac-2026. Accessed: 2026-07-17.
  11. [11] Joan Busquets (2005). Barcelona: the urban evolution of a compact city. Type: book. Locator: busquets-barcelona. Accessed: 2026-07-17.
  12. [12] Ajuntament de Barcelona / Fabra i Coats Fàbrica de Creació (n.d.). Fabra i Coats — fàbrica i reutilització cultural. Type: industrial_heritage. Locator: fabra-coats. Accessed: 2026-07-17.
  13. [13] MUHBA / Ajuntament de Barcelona (n.d.). MUHBA — Museu d'Història de Barcelona (publicacions i jaciments). Type: museum. Locator: muhba. Accessed: 2026-07-17.
  14. [14] AHCB / Ajuntament de Barcelona (n.d.). Arxiu Històric de la Ciutat de Barcelona — fons i cartografia. Type: archive. Locator: ahcb. Accessed: 2026-07-17.
  15. [15] Ajuntament de Barcelona (n.d.). Catàleg de patrimoni arquitectònic de Barcelona. Type: heritage_catalogue. Locator: heritage-catalog. Accessed: 2026-07-17.
  16. [16] FAVB (n.d.). Federació d'Associacions de Veïns i Veïnes de Barcelona. Type: civil_society. Locator: favb. Accessed: 2026-07-17.
  17. [17] AMCB / Ajuntament de Barcelona (n.d.). Arxiu Municipal Contemporani de Barcelona. Type: archive. Locator: amcb. Accessed: 2026-07-17.
  18. [18] Ajuntament de Barcelona (n.d.). Nomenclàtor dels carrers de Barcelona. Type: gazetteer. Locator: nomenclator-bcn. Accessed: 2026-07-17.
  19. [19] TMB (n.d.). Transports Metropolitans de Barcelona — xarxa de metro. Type: transport. Locator: tmb. Accessed: 2026-07-17.

Last reviewed: 17 July 2026 · 19 sources consulted

Return to top