After nearly 30 years of successive closures and reopenings, El Molino faces a new stage of stable programming. The entity in charge of bringing the venue back to life will be Barcelona Events Musicals, organizer of events such as the Cruïlla Festival, whose project will set a calendar yet to be determined.
With a four-year contract extendable to four more, this award approved by the City Council aims to close this cycle of intermittent activity by a venue that was key in Barcelona during the first half of the 20th century. The space closed in 1997 to reopen in 2010, but closed again three years later. The City Council announced its purchase in 2021 for 6.2 million euros, with the aim of recovering the activity of the emblematic building with windmills on Paral·lel Avenue.
The Barcelona Events Musicals project aims to turn El Molino into a reference space for minority music genres in the city, such as "roots music, singer-songwriter music, jazz, flamenco, and Catalan rumba." Furthermore, it aspires to "recover the old strength and recognition of El Molino to project it again as a great city venue," and not only in Barcelona, but they also aim to give it an international dimension.
The future Molino is part of a Paral·lel that has set out to recover its splendorTo this end, the project is born with the will to foster collaboration and networking, and already has the support of prominent actors in the Barcelona music scene. In fact, it has collaboration agreements with representative entities of multiple styles, such as Barnasants, El Dorado and Carabutsi, as well as higher music schools such as Taller de Músics, Conservatori del Liceu, Esmuc and Jam Session.
The project with which El Molino will be reborn also counts on the collaboration of various training schools in musical and audiovisual management, in addition to equipment of the level of L'Auditori and the nearby venue Paral·lel 62, which in 2022 succeeded the old Barts venue.
Barcelona Events aims to progressively nourish the venue's programming, with the intention of eventually occupying all days of the week through a wide range of activities, also in its rehearsal rooms and its club with a terrace. Proposals such as jam sessions, open mic, workshops, festival presentations, and activities linked to theater, comedy, and dance will fill the spaces of this emblematic venue.
Musical gastronomy
The awarded project has been planned with the collaboration of the team from the Florería Atlántico restaurant and cocktail bar, and has been conceived with the intention that the gastronomic proposal be linked to El Molino's artistic programming, establishing a symbiosis between both elements.
Signature cocktails will play a fundamental role on the menu, with cocktails inspired by El Molino's trajectory and the artists who have marked the musical history not only of the venue, but also of Paral·lel and the entire city. In addition, El Molino will add a third dimension to the musical and gastronomic sphere: the pedagogical one, which will offer training workshops, collaboration with schools, and visits in collaboration with educational centers and other institutions.
The future reopening adds to improvements in Paral·lel such as the transformation of the area around the Tres XemeneiesThe future Molino is part of a Paral·lel that has set out to recover its splendor and once again promote the development of the avenue as a cultural hub. "The award allows progress in the commitment to recover the best Paral·lel as a strategic axis for music and performing arts in the city, which in the future will also have a fundamental piece like the Teatre Arnau," defended the mayor, Jaume Collboni.
These two facilities join others that already act as a cultural hub in Paral·lel, which is also seeing areas of its surroundings transformed, such as the Parc de les Tres Xemeneies. The avenue is determined to position itself again as a reference cultural axis dynamizing its surroundings through facilities such as Sala Apolo, the Albareda Cultural Center, the already reborn Paral·lel 62, and the new Molino, called to play a key role in this axis.