Seat: Factory of Transformations
By Charlotte Stace
Castell de Montjuïc’s latest exhibition, La SEAT: Factory of Transformations, uses one car company to tell a much bigger story about Barcelona. It looks at how SEAT’s arrival reshaped the city far beyond the world of engines and assembly lines, accelerating the industrialisation of the Zona Franca and helping create a modern workers’ neighbourhood in La Marina.
The show follows that transformation through five sections, moving from the decision to establish the factory in Barcelona to the architecture of the plant, the company’s economic impact and the everyday lives of the people who worked there. It also explores SEAT as a key site of labour struggle under Francoism, where workers’ organisation became part of the city’s democratic memory.
This isn’t just for car enthusiasts - it's about work, housing, migration, protest and how a factory can change the shape and social fabric of an entire city.