Eduard Balcells

Eduard Balcells Montané is an architect and urban designer, founder and director of the office Eduard Balcells Architecture + Urbanism + Landscape, based in Barcelona, working in the overlapping fields of Architecture, Urbanism and Landscape with innovative, remarkable and sustainable design solutions. Outstanding projects by the office include: the new Waldorf School El Til·ler -The Linden Tree- in Bellaterra, Barcelona; the School in Sant Cugat, an innovative, biophilic and vertical new school typology in Barcelona; ​the Strategic Development Plan for the Fumanya Dinosaurs Park, the most important dinosaur footprint site in Europe, located in the Pyrenees; the first phase of this Plan, the Dinosaurs Trail, an outdoors itinerary to bring visitors close to the dinosaurs footprints; the redesign and extension of the main square of the village of Sant Jordi de Cercs, in the Berguedà region and Mesto Malina, the master plan for a new 250,000m2 sustainable neighbourhood on an old military site in the city of Malacky, Slovakia, as outcome of winning the international competition held for the purpose. For the City of Barcelona he has elaborated the urban development study The New Urban Fabrik, which proposes revitalization strategies for the 300,000 m2 Torrent Estadella industrial area -the last industrially-zoned land within Barcelona outside the harbour​- through the introduction of a green industries cluster and the reconnection with the surrounding neighborhoods.

He has been the winner of several international competitions, among which Europan, the most recognized biennial competition of architecture and urban design for young European architects, in its twelfth and thirteenth editions. He has also been guest professor of urban design at the University of Liechtenstein and has lectured at several European universities. His work has been widely published in international design media and recognized in architecture awards.

He obtained his professional experience as project leader, architect and urban designer in internationally recognized practices, such as MVRDV and West8 in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, and Josep Lluís Mateo and Roldán+Berengué in Barcelona. He studied at the Higher Technical School of Architecture of Barcelona -ETSAB-, where he received the Honour Prize as the best Graduation Project with Permeable Cerdà, an intervention of urban revitalization through public space and multifunctional productive buildings in an existing block of the old industrial district of Poblenou, in Barcelona.