The presence of modernism in Lloret de Mar was possible thanks to the imprint of the Indianos, who, with the wealth obtained overseas, were able to hire some of the most outstanding architects and artists of the time. They built houses, churches, gardens, and even a cemetery that today is considered one of the most interesting in the territory.
Before tourists discovered the beauty of Lloret de Mar's beaches and coves, the city already had a close relationship with the sea. Firstly as a fishing village and, later, with overseas trade.
In the mid-eighteenth century, there were many Lloret sailors who went to America to seek their fortune. They were the Indians, who in Lloret de Mar were called Americans.
In 1778, King Carlos III promulgated the Free Trade Decree with the American colonies, and this was the definitive impulse for many to embark on this adventure. It was the time when large ships began to be built on the beaches of Lloret to go to America.
The ships spent between four and six months to make the trip to Santiago de Cuba, Havana, Montevideo, Buenos Aires… They were loaded with wines, oils, fabrics, salt, flour and other merchandise; and they returned to Catalonia loaded with cotton, noble woods, skins, sugar, tobacco, coffee, rum, jerky…
Walking through the historic center of Lloret de Mar you will find the church of Sant Romà, patron saint of Lloret de Mar and a heritage example that reflects two very different periods of construction and architecture.
On the front you will find the Gothic part (dated between 1509 and 1522), with its beautiful and austere portal, and in contrast, on the sides, you will be surprised by the explosion of color of the domes and the mosaic of the twelve apostles inspired by the art of the modernist movement of the late nineteenth century.
The Indian past surrounds her. When the people from Lloret returned who left for the Americas to make their fortune, they found a sad and impoverished people, very different from what they were used to.
Different Indian families began the reform for the construction of a new church, which began in 1912 and ended in 1930.
With the Civil War, the interior part was destroyed, but the structure managed to remain standing.
After the war, with donations from some Indians such as Narcís Gelats, it was decided to build a new, larger and more modern church until it achieved the appearance it has today with two beautiful side chapels: the Santíssim and the Baptismal.
Casa Indiana built in 1877 belonged to the Indian Nicolau Font i Maig who made his fortune in Cuba. It has wonderful modernist details such as the entrance door, the double sink in the bathroom on the main floor, but most of the furniture has come from Can Garriga or from donations of objects from the time by the residents of the town. Currently, it is a house-museum that shows what the Indian houses of that time were like.
Some curiosities of the house is that it was one of the first to have electricity in Lloret de Mar, that they had a space to do mass or that they had a courtesy bathroom for guests on the first floor, something that was a real luxury in the epoch.
The 300-meter Jacint Verdaguer urban promenade is located on the seafront, between the Casa de Villa in Lloret de Mar and the Verdaguer Cultural Center in Can Garriga.
Lloret de Mar's promenade was born from the new alignments produced by the American adventure and, really, by the action and designs of architects such as Martí Sureda and Fèliz de Azúa, among others. The promenade was projected and devised in 1869 by Martí Sureda Deulovol (1822-1890). The Lloret master builder Joan Lluhí i Rissech and the provincial architect Félix de Azúa participated in the drafting. The work ends in 1972 and is closely linked to the construction works of the City Council.
The name of Jacint Verdaguer was given to it at the beginning of the 20th century (1914), since it originally received the name of Paseo de Mar. Curiously, it is in the municipality of Lloret that the priest and poet Jacint Verdaguer (1845-1902) received one of the first posthumous monuments and/or reminders, the Monument of the Angel (1904) in the place of Ses Pedres Lluïdores, on the way to San Pedro del Bosque. In 1878-79 there was an alignment project in Lloret, carried out by Frederic Esteve, which provided for an ideal expansion with similarities to the Cerdà expansion in Barcelona.
In 1919, the Marquis of Roviralta commissioned the project for the Santa Clotilde gardens to a young landscaper and architect: Nicolau Maria Rubió i Tudurí. The land currently occupied by the gardens was dedicated to planting vines and the Marquis gradually acquired them until reaching its current extension of 26,830 m². The gardens are located on a cliff overlooking the sea, between Cala Boadella and Fenals beach.
The Museum of the Sea, formerly the house of Enric Garriga y Mataró, a Lloret native who emigrated to Cienfuegos (Cuba) and became rich with construction materials. This building, built in the second half of the 19th century and located on Paseo Verdaguer, is the emblem of a glorious past, when some people from Lloret left everything to seek their fortune in the Americas.
From fishing to commercial cabotage and the history of overseas trade, the building bears witness to the legacy of the Indianos, an immersive and authentic journey through the history of Lloret and its close relationship with the sea.
Former Benedictine monastery, which Nicolau Font i Maig bought by proxy from Havana, taking advantage of the ecclesiastical confiscation of 1855. Later, he enlarged it and converted part of it into an asylum. He commissioned the project to Puig i Cadafalch. Currently, it is a private space that houses a hotel and a restaurant
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