Barcelona Wax Museum - Banck of Barcelona

This building, built in 1873, originally consisted only of a ground floor that was designed by Domingo Balet Nadal on behalf of Mr. Cristobal Taltabull (father of the famous composer and musical pedagogue who received his name) and where the Compañia General de Crédito was located. El Comercio> founded by Ignasi Girona Agrafel.

The building is located on Passatge de la Banca, formerly known as Passatge del Comerç, as can be seen in Domènec Balet's original location map. Interestingly, the two nameplates of the passage are still preserved today.

In 1892 Mr. Pablo Sadó Perez, Manager of Crèdit Mutu Fabril i Mercantil, popularly known as Caixa Vilumara (in reference to the surname of the family that owned it), asked the Master Builder Domènec Balet for the project to go back. one more floor and added decorative elements, a balustrade and the plaque with the name of the financial institution on the roof.

As can be seen in the plan of the aforementioned Master of Works, which is below; drawn in black we see the original building with a single ground floor and in red the extension.

As we also explained in the life section, in September 2022 we discovered that the sculpture that crowns the building of the Barcelona Wax Museum is the work of Enric Clarasó i Daudí and to everyone's surprise, it had not previously been cataloged as part of her work, so she was a true stranger.

Caja Vilumara began its activity in 1862 and ended its days in 1914, merged with the Bank of Barcelona, which acquired its shares and also this building, which was its headquarters.

During this period, the architect Josep Oriol Mestre was commissioned to add a second floor.

Years later, in 1922, the Bank of Barcelona went bankrupt and the building became the property of the Credit and Docks entity.

In 1973, Enrique Alarcón decided to undertake a new project with the building itself: transform it into a wax museum. The architect and also the set designer, chose this property as he considered it ideal for the mystery and charm it conveyed.

Location: Pasage de la Banca Nº7. 

Source: Arxivo Contemporaneo de Barcelona, Museo de cera de Barcelona; Wikipedia

In the work section of this website we can find more projects that Domingo Balet carried out for the Vilumara family, such as the Casa Vilumara (a twin building to the Casa Pere LLibre on Paseo de Gracia), an urbanization project for some land and the family pantheon: