Barcelona Opportunity Week

The second edition of the Barcelona Opportunity Week, until 5 February, is seeing 20% more restaurants, hotels, markets, florists’ and cultural venues joining in and offering discounts. This year’s initiative includes offers on flights to visit the city, although a good many of the discounts are aimed at Barcelona’s own residents.

Michelin-starred restaurants with 35-euro menus, bouquets of flowers for 11 euros, half-price theatre tickets and special rates at hotels are just some of the offers in Barcelona Opportunity Week.

Last year more than 15.000 people took part in this week of discounts, there were 600 overnight stays and over 20.000 euros were collected through charity contributions.

Barcelona Fashion Week

The inauguration of the “Hall of Fame“, an exhibition of photographs from Vanity Fair on Passeig de Gràcia, kicks of this year’s Barcelona Fashion Week, which features even more activities than before. Besides, Avinguda Maria Cristina has a display of work by Manuel Outumuro, an industry expert, for Marie Claire.

Several new initiatives are joining the urban fashion show, The Brandery, which opens on 27 January, the 080 Barcelona Fashion catwalk, which this year will be in the Gothic setting of the Plaça del Rei, and the pioneering ModaFad catwalk, dedicated to up-and-coming designers.

One of the new events this year is BeCo, the first ethical fashion platform in Spain, which aims to set up and promote sustainable projects in the fashion industry. This new platform, which champions issues like workers’ rights and products used to manufacture fashion goods.

Although it won’t be taking place until 5 and 6 February, the new show Little Barcelona also forms part of Fashion Week. This new event has an international profile and will bring together 50 brands drawn from the children’s fashion industry, as well as from related areas like the decoration and furniture sectors.

The 080 Barcelona Fashion catwalk, from 25-28 January, will showcase the work of 25 brands and designers, including Desigual, taking part for the first time. TCN will raise the curtain on 080, for which the special guest this year is Pierre Cardin, one of contemporary fashion’s true greats.

The Brandery Catwalk, which is circular, allows visitors to see the exhibitors’ designs in movement. Custo, Replay and Superdry are just three of the 40 brands parading there.

Fangoria, The Zombie Kids, 2manydjs and Dorian concerts are set to perform at the trade fair site and tickets to their performances include entry to the fair the same afternoon.

30th edition of the Barcelona International Comic Fair

From 3 to 6 May 2012, the 30th edition of the Barcelona International Comic Fair will be turning the spotlight on robots (dedicating its main exhibition): Mazinger Z, the Transformers, Arale from Dr Slump, Astroboy… The list of comic robot heroes goes on and on.

And featuring one of the big names in the world of comics & robots: Gô Nagai, the creator of Mazinger Z, the legendary robot with rocket fists is also celebrating his birthday: his 40th.

Also coming are Milo Manara, one of the great masters of European comics; Paul Cornell, the scriptwriter for the Doctor Who series; Scott Snyder, the scriptwriter for the new Batman series and The Swamp Thing; Guy Delisle, the author of Pyongyang and Burma Chronicles; Rags Morales, an illustrator for the re-launched Action Comics, and Sergio Aragonés, an illustrator for MAD magazine.

Robots in their ink (Robots en la seva tinta) is the title of the Fair’s robotics exhibition. The exhibition, which aims both to entertain and to inform, will explore the relationship between robots and comics, cinema and literature.

The exhibition will have a section devoted to the robots from the Star Wars universe, entitled, Droids from the Galaxies (Droides de les galàxies) as well as educational areas and an activities programme that include robotics workshops and classes on how to draw robots.

Ah, and for those of you who will turn 30 this year (born in 1982) you’ll have free entry. Many happy returns!

Claude Cahun at La Virreina Centre de la Imatge

Lucy Schwob used the pseudonym Claude Cahun during her multidisciplinary artistic career. She was a writer, a woman of theatre and a photographer, and for years unjustly forgotten about until the 1980s when two exhibitions on her were held in France.

This exhibition has organized by Jeu de Paume, París, and coproduced with La Virreina Centre de la Imatge, Barcelona, and The Art Institute of Chicago. The purpose for the exhibition Claude Cahun is to bring the image of this artist up to date and highlight her continued validity with regard to contemporary practices and discourses.

Nonetheless, this exercise is based, not only on pointing to contemporary works, artists or discourses that invite one to think of Cahun as a precedent, but also on exploring the successive ways in which the critical frames through which “her” work has been studied have been updated themselves. These revivals and evaluations of Cahun from different perspectives have thrown light on and complemented the many different facets of the artist’s creative practice.

La Virreina Centre de la Imatge -> la Rambla, 99 – Ciutat Vella
Dates: From 28/10/2011 to 05/02/2012 | Free entrance

50th anniversary of the debut of Montserrat Caballe at Gran Teatre del Liceu

Montserrat Caballé made her debut at the Gran Teatre del Liceu and in Spain on Monday 7 January 1962, in Richard Strauss’ Arabella.

This concert celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Liceu debut of the great soprano from Barcelona. Her emotional and professional relationship with the theatre was soon consolidated by her performances as Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni and Cio-Cio-San in Madama Butterfly. These were the first steps in a long and close partnership that has included many of her most seminal interpretations: Norma, Roberto Devereux, Maria  Stuarda, Lucrezia Borgia, Il Pirata, Aida, Un ballo in maschera, I vespri sicilianni, and others. The Liceu awarded her its Gold Medal in 1966 and now rounds off this sincere tribute with an exhibition in the Foyer recalling the most significant and memorable events in an exceptional joint biography.

Hotel 1898, located in Las Ramblas, is the nearest hotel to Gran Teatre del Liceu.

Gran Teatre del Liceu -> La Rambla, 51 | Ciutat Vella

Barcelona Children’s Festival

The Children’s Festival has been entertaining kids since 1963. This year is no exception, with the festival boasting more than one hundred and fifty different activities of all kinds at the Montjuïc exhibition venue.

One of the main features this year is sport, with a recreation of the Olympic Stadium and the presence of some of Barça‘s footballers. Some of the other attractions include go-karts, ponies, traditional games, video games, concerts, magic shows and a visit from some of the Sesame Street characters from Port Aventura.

Take part in this unforgettable experience; in the numerous sporting, recreational and educational activities being organized at the Children’s Festival, a fabulous fiesta where fun is guaranteed. The best way to teach values ​​such as creativity, solidarity, respect for diversity and the environment. It also promotes the sport and the Mediterranean food. Here you can participate in interactive science activities, recycling or responsible consumption, road safety circuits, workshops on how to care for pets, crafts and drawing competitions.

You can find more information at Festival Website.

Núñez i Navarro Hotels wishes you Merry Christmas

We wish you Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Barcelona: Ice Rink at Plaça Catalunya

Until 8 January, you can get your skates on the ice rink at the Plaça de Catalunya , sponsored by the Barcelona Comerç Foundation.

Measuring 40 by 30 square metres, Barcelona is the biggest outdoor ice rink in Europe. And it has a special ice zone for children too.

The rink, which is crowned by a semi-transparent dome, boasts a cafeteria and changing rooms. Half-hour and one-hour skating sessions will cost 6 euros and 8 euros respectively.

Tickets can be purchased at a discount with tickets given away by shops in the Barcelona Comerç shopping districts.

It will take a maximum of between 350 and 400 people, depending on the number of children on the rink, plus a supervisor, and three to six assistant monitors.

The rink will be open from 10 am to 9 pm, Mondays to Thursdays and on Sundays; 10 am to 11 pm on Fridays, Saturdays and public holidays; 10 am to 8 pm on Christmas Eve; 11 am to 2 pm on Christmas Day, and 10 am to 8 pm on 31 December.

Barcelona 100 Souvenirs by Barcelona City Council

We’ve all strolled down the Rambla, touched the Canaletes Fountain, visited Parc Güell and other sites in the city known in every guide book. And yet, even the most famous of these have stories few of us know about. Fancy discovering them?

One of these is “Barcelona 100 Souvenirs“, published by Barcelona City Council. It pays tribue to the our city’s souvenirs and icons, through a route that puts the emphasis on curiosities. For example, did you know that the tradition of celebrating Barça’s titles at the Canaletes Fountain dates back to the 1930′s? As radios were not yet commonly used in those days, a newspaper would announce the results on a board next to the fountain.

You will also discover that Gaudí, the master of wrought iron technique, made the “Margallons“, iron gates decorated with palmetto-leaf designs, at the Casa Vicens, in the heart of Gràcia, part of which was moved to the entrance gate at Parc Güell; or that the origin of the current City Hall building goes back to the “Saló de Cent“, a 14th-century Gothic structure where the city’s hundred representatives would meet.

Barcelona Buff Epic Run 2011

The city’s most congenial annual race, amazing participants and the public alike, is back, kicking off at Montjuïc Castle at 11 am this Sunday 18 December.

And that is because the Buff Epic Run, an extreme obstacle race, leaves no-one unmoved, with its perfect combination of sport and laughter. An 8-km route that includes mud and foam swimming pools, tyre mountains, straw walls, rope mazes and other surprising obstacles. All that plus music and a big sausage fest.

Once again, it will be offering highly original prizes: from the oldest participant to the runner who travelled furthest to take part, as well as prizes for best group or individual fancy dress, given that fancy dress earns you points on this run.

What is more, for the second consecutive year, there will be a run specially devised for participants between the ages of 13 and 16, the Mini Buff Epic Run, which covers 1.5 km and sets off at 11.10 am.

There are fewer than 200 places left and the registration period closes today, 15 December.

Castell de Montjuïc -> Ctra Montjuïc, 66 | Sants-Montjuïc

Next Page »