The neighborhood surrounding Sants Estación, Barcelona’s main railway station west of the city center, is a quiet one, but the arrival of the Nobu Hotel Barcelona has invigorated it with fresh energy. “It has really changed the area and is bringing a lot of traffic,” says Eva Longoria, principal and studio leader of Rockwell Group’s Madrid office.
Prior to its glamorous makeover, the building was “a fairly banal tower that didn’t have much character. It had seen much better days,” says Rockwell Group partner and studio leader Greg Keffer, so one of the firm’s biggest challenges was “making the tower a destination,” adds Longoria. “Many people on that side of the city go to the other for dinner. Now it is happening in the opposite direction, too.”
