Built at the end of the 50s, on the same site where the old Liceo cinema was (1914-1956). The building was projected on a rather irregular plot, a consequence of the urban evolution of the place. It is for this reason that the architect opted for a layout based on placing the projection room at full height enveloped by an "L"-shaped volume, where the rest of the elements of the program, such as a bar, meeting rooms, offices, a service area, different warehouses and vertical communications.
This arrangement solved all the requirements in an optimal and elegant way. From fitting a magnificent projection room, with more than 1500 seats distributed between the audience and the floor; by allowing and making the different accesses and circulations within the building compatible, avoiding the conflict between the bar, social centre and the cinema; until managing to generate a perfect acoustic cushion between the screening room and the noisy Sants Streets.
As it could not be otherwise, the result is a complex building with an organic plant resulting from the various interrelationships of the program. What stood out was a 32m long bar, which could be separated with several mobile panels in order to be able to work as a bar and a cinema at the same time.
Unfortunately, and for some years now, little remains of the original project; beyond the façade of abstract composition characteristic of modern language, and the bar that has been cut and modified. The screening room is preserved, although disused and quite battered, without seats and with substantial modifications. The building is currently occupied by a dance school, a gym and an appliance store.
This building is located on a corner plot and the program is divided into two parts: a movie theatre and a centre for social activities for the neighbourhood. Moragas decided to place the cinema in the inner part of the site and fit the social centre into the perimeter of the two façades, occupying a wide L-shaped strip that acts as an acoustic barrier for the cinema.
The access to the building is through a large lobby that is equipped with a 32-metre-long undulating bar counter, one of the longest in Barcelona. The rest of the ground floor and the mezzanine are occupied by bar tables and a billiards room. In section, there are two other floors located above the lobby and below the inclined plane of the amphitheatre that are used for the social activities of the neighbourhood. The first is used as a meeting room and the second contains the offices of various sports entities. On the other hand, the huge stained-glass window on the main façade offers a cinematographic perception of the building's activity from the outside. The colour, the materials, the small projections and the opaque areas help to conceive an abstract composition of the façade.
