Contemporary Mediterranean Style for Compartir Barcelona Restaurant by El Equipo Creativo

The Barcelona -based studio, El Equipo Creativo, designed Compartir Restaurant Barcelona by Disfrutar Barcelona, the award-winning trio of chefs Mateu Casañas, Oriol Castro, and Eduard Xatruch. Opened in June 2022, Compartir Barcelona is their third restaurant. As the name Compartir (to share) suggests, diners share dishes. Borrowing from the philosophy of their first restaurant, Compartir Cadaqués, the gastronomic offer is presented à la carte on a central platter, with a traditional menu made with classic ingredients but interpreted from a modern perspective.

Compartir Barcelona restaurant is located in a bright, spacious building at street level, in a large premise in Barcelona’s Eixample, near the emblematic Passeig de Gràcia. The design won an award in the category of Interior Design Europe for the LIV Hospitality Design Awards.

For the interior, the design firm sought to recreate the essence of the town of Cadaques, and Compartir Cadaqués, near Dali’s villa in an area replete with artisans-basketry, wicker, and textiles. However, for their new restaurant, they interpreted the design from a perspective that is more urban and contemporary. The restaurant is in a classic venue in the Eixample district, which resembles an art gallery that is common in this area. ”We look for a warm, light materiality with a Mediterranean touch, translated into warm white textured surfaces and a general handmade touch. Different natural materials connect us with the architectural landscape of Cadaqués”.”

The mirrors and wicker dividers have organic forms that, together with the warmth emitted by their integrated lighting, contrast with the hard finishes. The wicker dividers recreate an abstract landscape of sails and vessels, referencing the Bay of Cadaques, and provide privacy to guests.

The colours and textures for the bars and kitchens reference Cadaques’s materiality: grey slate mosaic combined with terracotta ceramics, contrasting with the intense blue. The technique used to lay the slate stone is a traditional Mediterranean technique called “trencadís.”. Next to the natural terracotta tile colour, they contrast with the abstract and intense blue of the windows.

Founded in 2010 by architects Oliver Franz Schmidt, Natali Canas del Pozo, and Lucas Echeveste Lacy, El Equipo Creativo is a Barcelona-based interior architecture studio specializing in hospitality design. They design spaces that tell stories and create sensations and atmospheres. They designed restaurants for some of the most prestigious chefs in the world, including those with 4-star Michelin restaurants, such as world-renowned Spanish chef Ferran Adrià.

Photography by Adrià Goula.

For another project by this design firm read El Equipo Creates Urban Retreat for Travelers and Locals in the Kimpton Vividora Barcelona.