Valls, kilometer zero of the món casteller, will finally be able to fulfill the dream of hosting the Museu Casteller de Catalunya. After many years of waiting, more than the City Council, its main supporter, would have wanted, the facility opens its doors on September 8. Tickets are already on sale (www.museucasteller.cat). Behind a calendar that has been postponed and criticism from the opposition for the high cost of the project, which the municipal government warns will be in deficit. "As are all the museums in the world," says Dolors Farré (Junts), mayoress of Valls.
"We are very satisfied that it is a reality, it has not been easy to push it forward," admits Farré. The delay is partly explained by the difficulty of executing the museumization project, with public tenders that were left unsuccessful.
The interpretation center, named Món Casteller, with an investment of nine million, is driven by a sum of administrations, balances and complicities. The consortium that will pilot it is made up of the Generalitat, the Provincial Council of Tarragona, the Valls City Council - the three administrations that have paid for it - and the Coordinadora de Colles Castelleres de Catalunya.
“It has come true because there were three great aspirations: that of the món casteller, as the home of all the castellers and the colles; that of an entire city; and as a revulsion of the historic center, located in a very degraded area, ”explains the mayoress. The urban transformation component is key. A cultural ring has been projected around the museum through public facilities: Library, Espai Jove and Museu Casteller. The Casa de la Festa, the Escola de Música and the civic center will also be located nearby.
The pending issue in the old neighborhood is housing, which has undergone a process of degradation, with buildings that have had to be demolished and others that are in a dilapidated state, with occupation and crime problems. The Consistory wants to promote new housing at the hands of private developers.
It is expected to be an economic and tourist boost for Valls and the Alt Camp region, which have known how to take advantage of traditions to attract visitors. Paradigmatic, the calçots, which like the castells are not an exclusive Vallenca but nowhere else have they managed to get as much economic juice out of it as here.
Valls jealously guards the details of the museum, a two-minute walk from the hypnotic Plaça del Blat, kilometer zero casteller. The building, by the architect Dani Freixes, has been built in a space gained in the historic center after demolishing old buildings, connecting the porches of Plaça del Blat and Plaça de l'Oli. A large circular patio nine meters in diameter in which a 15-meter tower of light rises towards the sky, some of the singular elements.
You will be able to live in the skin of the castellers, understand the reasons for a unique expression of popular and collective culture. With almost 3,000 m² in an immersive space, the values of the castells will stand out, fundamental for recognition as World Heritage of Humanity (2010). Museography combines heritage, to disseminate a tradition with more than two centuries of history, and modernity. Audiovisual, sensory montages, to show the world the magic of the castles and their spectacularity.
With different reading levels, to seduce the casteller aficionado but also the neophyte, the target audience is Catalan and international tourism. The challenge, to become one of the most visited museums in Catalonia, far from Barcelona.
