The Picasso Museum occupies five large town houses or palaces on the street carrer de Montcada. The original palaces date from the 13th-15th centuries, undergoing major refurbishments over time, the most important in the 18th century.
The palaces are a good example of Catalan civic gothic style. They have a common structure surrounding a courtyard with access to the main floor via an outdoor open stairway.
The street called Carrer de Montcada is today the most important area of mediaeval civic architecture in the city.
It starts with the Romanesque Marcus chapel (12th century) and finishes at Plaça del Born. It used to be all one single street until the 19th century, when it was divided into two by the opening of Carrer Princesa in 1853.
Its name derives from the important Montcada family from Barcelona who, it appears, received the land in the 12th century for the support lent to King Ramon Berenguer IV by Guillem Ramon de Montcada during the conquest of Majorca.
The first homes outside the city walls emerged in the mid-12th century. The street linked the Bòria commercial district with the old sailing quarter of Vilanova del Mar, leading to the creation of the Ribera district. At the end of that century, the area was incorporated into the new city walls, experiencing its greatest splendour from the 15th to the 16th century. It was then an aristocratic street inhabited by noble families and rich merchants who had earned their fortune from the sea trade.
At the end of the 19th and in the early 20th century, the street underwent significant alterations and a decline in the area’s residential nature.
The street was declared an artistic-historical heritage site in 1947.
The Picasso Museum was first opened in the Gothic Aguilar Palace palau gòtic Aguilar (Montcada, 15) in 1963. The City Council extended the museum by annexing the Baró de Castellet Palace palau del Baró de Castellet (Montcada, 17) in 1970 and then with the Meca Palace palau Meca (Montcada, 19). A new museum extension was opened in 1999 at the casa Mauri and the Finestres Palace palau Finestres with space for temporary exhibitions. These five palaces presently constitute the Barcelona Picasso Museum.
Admission
Museum + temporary exhibition € 9
Temporary exhibition € 5.80
