Free museum Sundays in Barcelona: where to go and when

The National Palace, this noble building dating back to the 1929 World’s Fair, houses the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya (MNAC) and its collection of works from sculpture, painting and drawings to prints, posters and photography, and with the objective of explaining the importance of Catalan art from the Romanesque period to the mid-20th century. It’s also home to some of the Thyssen-Bornemisza collection.

Admission is free every Saturday from 3pm, and on the first Sunday of every month. Admission is also free Sep 11, as well as on May 18, coinciding with International Museum Day.

Stretching from Plaça del Rei to the Cathedral are some 4,000sq m (43,000sq ft) of subterranean Roman excavations – streets, villas and storage vats for oil and wine, all discovered by accident in the late 1920s when a whole swath of the Gothic Quarter was dug up to make way for the central avenue of Via Laietana. The excavations continued until 1960; today, the labyrinth can be reached via Casa Padellàs, a merchant’s palace dating from 1498, which was laboriously moved from its original location in C/Mercaders to allow the construction of Via Laietana.

Admission is free every Sunday from 3pm and all day the first Sunday of every month. Other free days include Santa Eulàlia feast day (on or around Feb 12), Sep 24 and May 18.

Spain’s largest cultural centre, the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona, was opened in 1994 at the Casa de la Caritat, a former almshouse, built in 1802 on the site of a medieval monastery. The massive façade and part of the courtyard remain from the original building; the rest was rebuilt in dramatic contrast, all tilting glass and steel. The centre features three large exhibition halls with rotating exhibitions; the first dedicated to smaller, lesser-known exhibitions and the other two reserved for larger features. 

Admission is free every Sunday from 3pm to 8pm (limited capacity requires advance booking), and on International Museum Day/Night (on or around May 18) and during the Mercè Festival (on or around Sep 24).

The Museu del Disseny de Barcelona is home to some 70,000 objects that show the evolution of the decorative arts in design and the works of contemporary artists. The permanent exhibitions feature objects of industrial design and products that illustrate what makes something an everyday item as well as a museum piece; a tour of the decorative arts, from the third century to the mid-20th century; textiles, especially how dresses have sculpted silhouettes throughout history; and paper, with a look at graphic design from the 1940s to the 1980s. The museum also includes a temporary exhibition space, a documentation centre that’s open to the public, and an archive dedicated to the collection and preservation of the collections.

Admission is free every Sunday from 3pm to 8pm and all day the first Sunday of every month. 

The MACBA (Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona) is housed in the impressive building by American architect Richard Meier in Plaça dels Àngels in the Raval. Since its inauguration in 1995, the MACBA has transformed itself into a power player on the city’s contemporary art scene. Its bookshop is fantastic for quirky gifts and artist design objects.

The MACBA does not open for free on Sundays, but you can get in for free on Saturdays from 4pm to 8pm. It also has an open day for Santa Eulàlia in February.

The permanent collection of some 3,800 pieces has now been spread across five adjoining palaces, two of which are devoted to temporary exhibitions. By no means an overview of the artist’s work, the Museu Picasso is rather a record of the vital formative years that the young Picasso spent nearby at La Llotja art school. The seamless presentation of Picasso’s development from 1890 to 1904, from deft pre-adolescent portraits to sketchy landscapes to the intense innovations of his Blue Period, is unbeatable, then it leaps to a gallery of mature Cubist paintings from 1917. 

Admission is free every Thursday from 5pm to 9pm (advance booking is recommended), and the first Sunday of every month, as well as all day May 18 and Sep 24.

Finally rehoused in the Auditori concert hall in 2007 after six years in hibernation, the Museu de la Música’s collections comprise over 1,600 instruments, displayed like precious jewels in red velvet and glass cases, along with multimedia displays, interactive exhibits and musical paraphernalia. With pieces spanning the ancient world to the modern day, and including instruments from all corners of the world, the museum’s high note is the world-class collection of 17th-century guitars.

Admission is free the first Sunday of every month, every Sunday from 3pm, every Thursday the museum is open from 6pm to 9pm, and the following dates: May 18, Jun 21, Sep 23 and 24, and Nov 22.

Frederic Marès (1893-1991) ‘collected’ everything he laid his hands on, from hairbrushes to opera glasses and gargoyles. Unlike most private 19th-century collectors, Marès didn't come from a wealthy family, but spent every penny he earned as a sculptor and art professor on broadening his hoardings. The exhibits here are divided into three main sections: sculpture dating from the Pre-Roman era to the 20th century; the Sentimental Museum, with objects from everyday life; and a room devoted to photography, and Marès’s study and library now filled with sculptures, many of them his own. The patio itself is a treasure.

Admission is free every Sunday from 3pm, and the first Sunday of every month from 11am-8pm, as well as for Santa Eulàlia, Corpus Christi, May 18 and Sep 24.

Even if you can’t tell a caravel from a catamaran, the excellent Museu Marítim de Barcelona is worth a visit, as the soaring arches and vaults of the vast former ‘drassanes’ (shipyards) represent one the most perfectly preserved examples of civil Gothic architecture in Spain. With the aid of an audio guide, the maps, mastheads, nautical instruments, multimedia displays and models show you how shipbuilding and navigation techniques have developed over the years. Admission also includes the beautiful 1917 ‘Santa Eulàlia’ schooner docked nearby in the Moll de la Fusta, and the Maritime often has some interesting temporary exhibitions.

Admission is free every Sunday from 3pm, for Santa Eulàlia in February, on May 18, and during the Mercè celebrations in September.

The construction of new access points for the 1992 Olympic Games facilities favoured the proposal to create a new botanical garden for the city. On Montjuïc, between the castle and the Olympic Stadium, the shape of the Jardí Botànic’s 14 hectares is reminiscent of a great amphitheatre. It boasts preserved collections of Mediterranean plants worldwide and magnificent views over the Llobregat delta, the Olympic Ring and part of the metropolitan area of Barcelona.

Admission is free every Sunday from 3pm and the first Sunday of every month all day, as well as the following dates: Feb 12, May 18 and Sep 24.

The Museum of Natural Sciences in the Parc del Fòrum is an open and dynamic space. All 9,000 square metres of it are spread over two floors. At the main entrance you're welcomed by the skeleton of a whale that beached itself on Catalan shores in 1862. Making its debut in 2020 is the Living Terrace, 7,100m2 of flora on the rooftop that’s adapted to the Mediterranean climate and particularly to the proximity to the sea.

Admission is free every Sunday from 3pm and the first Sunday of the month all day, as well as Feb 12, May 18 and Sep 24.

The Museu Etnològic i de Cultures del Món has its central location in the Lió palace on C/Montcada. The museum focuses on artistic and cultural diversity from different areas of Africa, Asia, the Americas and Oceania. At the Montjuïc headquarters, you'll find more of look at modern society.

Admission is free every Sunday from 3pm and the first Sunday of every month all day.

El Born Centre de Cultura i Memòria The old Born market has reopened as a cultural center. Inside the iron and glass structure built by Josep Fontserè in 1876 are preserved archaeological remains from 1700 of the district of Vilanova de Mar. You can walk around this area and visit the 'De les pedres a les persones' ('From Stones to People') exhibition and archaeological sites. These are the main attractions of this centre that aims to show how life in the city was before and after the siege of 1713-1714.

Admission into the centre is always free. Admission is free into the two exhibition halls the first Sunday of every month.

German architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe built the Pavelló Alemany (German Pavilion) for the 1929 International Exhibition not as a gallery but as a simple reception space, sparsely furnished with his trademark ‘Barcelona Chair’, all in close collaboration with German modernist designer Lilly Reich. The pavilion was a founding monument of modern rationalist architecture, with its flowing floor plan and revolutionary use of materials. 

Admission is free the first Sunday of every month.

Foto Colectania also has a photography collection that includes more than 2,500 works by Spanish and Portuguese photographers from 1950 to the present. It also has a free consultation library and a holding room where they keep their photographic backlog, the Paco Gómez collection (donated by his family in 2001) and part of the John Redón collection.

Admission is free the first Sunday of every month.

The programme at La Virreina Centre de la Imatge features photography, audiovisual works, election broadcasts, book publishing, literary festivals, talks, digital documentation and expanded literature in the age of the image, among others. With a mission to explore the notion of the image as knowledge and also as a way of sparking new cultural experiences, La Virreina aims to forge its own identity within the network of spaces in Barcelona, as well as working closely with other centres for visual creation.

Admission is always free.