Cohousing continues to gain momentum in Barcelona. This is demonstrated by the exhibition “Living in community in housing cooperatives in Barcelona”, which can be visited, free of charge, at the headquarters of Coòpolis (C. Constitució, 19, Bloc 8) from Monday to Friday from 9 am to 7 pm. This is a good opportunity to discover a booming model in the city through an exhibition that has already been visited by dozens of people since it is open to the public.
These visitors include those who attended, last Tuesday, February 28, the guided tour of the exhibition, commissioned by the architects’ cooperative Lacol and the Barcelona City Council. Led by an architect member of the La Borda cooperative, the participants were able to learn more about the benefits of an alternative and eminently communitarian housing model.
Data, particularities of the model, values it promotes, participating cooperatives, and presentation of the different projects developed in the city are some of the contents of interest that can be found in the exhibition. In short, complete radiography of the expansion of cooperative housing in the transfer of use or cohousing in Barcelona, translates into 19 projects and more than 400 homes in coexistence or with available land. In fact, in the Catalan capital alone there are more housing cooperatives than in the rest of Catalonia (16).
Currently, cooperatives are developing wherever they find spaces of opportunity, taking into account that monthly payments are almost 40% lower than the average rent in the city, a difference that is accentuated in neighborhoods with higher incomes. The typology of transfer of use, moreover, is based on a non-speculative tenure model that has its inhabitants in the center, and that is not pigeonholed in either renting or buying.
Projects are driven by creativity, community management, and open, participatory design with the minimum possible ecological impact, some of which have been recognized in the form of awards. This is the case of the La Borda building, the first new cohousing building launched in the city, which has received several distinctions, such as the Ciutat de Barcelona 2018 award and the special prize for innovation at the European Responsible Housing Awards 2019, as well as the European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture – Mies van der Rohe Award 2022.
Industrialised construction, another focus of interest
In parallel to cohousing, the Barcelona City Council also invites citizens to learn more about the industrialised construction drive in the city, which is reflected in the many developments that have been launched in recent years, that are currently under construction, or that will take place shortly. They can do so through the exhibition located on the first floor of the APROP housing in Glòries (C. Irena Sendler, 22), open to the public every Friday from 9 am to 2 pm and from 3 pm to 6 pm. In this case, it is also free and does not require prior registration.