Selva de Mar, Poblenou

There are many such juxtapositions of the old and the new in the 22@ area of Barcelona, reminiscent of the Changing New York recorded in Berenice Abbott's 1935-1938 Works Progress Administration/Federal Art Project documenting the rapidly changing built environment of that city, with such images as Construction old and new, from Washington Street #37, Manhattan (August 12, 1936).


These pale walls of apartment houses on Passeig del Taulat, one side of a square surrounding the tall cylindrical tower of variegated brick reds of the Torre d'Aigües de Macosa (Can Girona) (1880-82) designed by Pere Falqués i Urpí, who is also responsible for the Universal Exhibition lampposts (1888) and other modernista street lamps such as the one with trencadí-encrusted base on Passeig de Gràcia (1906). Pere Falqués i Urpí (1850-1916) was municipal architect of Barcelona 1889-1914, a position he got in competition with Domènech i Montaner, and during this period he made more than lampposts and chimneys.
Torre d'Aigües de Macosa is one of the 46 original items in the now 114-long list of sites of the Patrimoni Industrial del Poblenou.