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Valencia is an ancient city. Home to paella and the Holy Grail, Spain’s third city is recognised as one of the most vibrant in the country. El Cid battled for it during one of the times the turncoat fought on the Christian side, and the Moorish leader Al-Azraq, known as the Blue-Eyed one long before Frank Sinatra, died below its walls. From the Barrio del Carmen, the medieval centre of the city, with its meandering cobbled alleyways, to the futuristic Ciudad de Artes y Ciencias, designed by Santiago Calatrava and recognised as one of the emblematic European architectural achievements, on par with the Guggenheim in Bilbao, the visitor can savour the sights and smells of a city that, despite its hospitality and modern outlook still remains Spanish to the core.

Valencia at last received international recognition when it was chosen to host the Americas Cup, the world’s most prestigious sailing event, and is set to become the Spanish city of the early years of the second millennium. But nothing can change its heart...a delight to the eye and a treat to the taste buds – and a whole lot more besides...

Mini Modernista
El Cabañal

As vistiors to Valencia pass through the ornate façade of the Estación del Norte some will go straight ahead through the Plaza de Ayuntamiento and into the Barrio del Carmen, while others of a more shopping frame of mind will turn right and wander past the bullring in the direction of El Corte Inglés and the fanciful shops of Calle Colon. Few will venture the fifteen minute bus ride to the Cabañal, the historic fishing area that runs parallel to the city’s beaches of Las Arenas and Malvarrosa.

The Cabañal forms part of the maritime district, known as Poble Nou del Mar, that runs north from the port. To the untrained eye the criss-cross grid of narrow streets may all form part of the same area, but to the locals the barrios of Nazaret, El Grau, Cañamelar, Cabañal and Malvarossa all have their individual identities.

Until recent times the inhabitants of Poble Nou were sailors, fishermen, port workers and farmers. The long, straight streets shadow the original layout, designed for the fisherment to lay out their nets. Originally the buildings would have been ‘barracas’ - typical Valencian steep-roofed thatched cottages – but during a time of economic boom and expansion during the 19th century the streets took on the eclectic and colourful Modinsta style popular at the time and were adorned by buildings decorated with ornate glazed ceramic tiles, semi-circular wrought iron balconies, barley-sugar twist pillars, fluted shell escutcheons, languid ladies heads with their flowing hair melting into ornate plaster relief work, done in the style known as art nouveau throughout the rest of Europe, but executed on a more intimate, human scale. The style was described by Professor Trinidad Simó as “….a peculiar popular modernism, made by and for the people which, although inspired by the designs of cities has its own style of free re-interpretation….Its distant link to the bourgeoise allows it a true creativity; naïve, vibrant, colourist, repetitive, but also singular, crafted, free of laws, ornate and direct.”

Whilst the Port of Valencia is the most important in Spain, fishing is no longer such a prominent industry. One of the few remaining associations with the historic nature of the Cabañal is Bar Casinet on Calle Pintor Ferandis, a great barn of a place originally built in the early 1900’s by the Sociedad Union Pescadores as a meeting point for fishermen where they could buy nets, ropes and all their fishing impedimenta. Now it is a domino players heaven, where ancients sit at marble-topped cast iron tables on an assortment of chairs that trace the evolution of that particular piece of furniture – either that or they were bought as a job lot from a junk shop. Castinet looks like it hasn’t had a lick of paint since the day it opened but it is still given an air of elegance by the splendid mirrors behind the bar advertising Pedro Domencq and Mauel Fernandez sherries. The shouts of triumph and rapid clacks of dominoes hitting marble are as noisy as the fish auction would have been fifty years ago.

Just up from Bar Casinet, inbetween numbers 15 and 16 is a tiny shop, little more than a door’s width where you can buy fresh clochinas (clotxines in Valenciano), the small mussels much lauded by the locals, and seriously weird looking dried fish.

As you wander down C/. Pintor Ferandis, with the sea breaze blowing from the beach at Malvarroso, glance to the left two blocks down from the Casinet and have a look at the high-rise pigeon loft behind the derelict yellow house on C/. Padre Luis Navarro.

Now long abandoned, but a beautiful construction of wooden slats and curving wooden supports that creates a minor architectural artwork.

C/ de la Reina is the main thoroughfare of the Cabañal and on it El Polp is set slap bang in the middle of the proposed extention to Avinida Blasco Ibañez. Bright and bustly since it opened its doors in 2000, it has become the spot-on place to eat in the Cabañal. Despite the fact that they knew the restaurant would be in the direct firing-line of theTown Hall’s much maligned plan to destroy a chunk of the historic fishing quarter by driving the extension through to the beach front, the three young owners, chef Tina, barman Paco, and waitress Rosi, opened El Polp as an initiative to try to recuperate the threatened area.

It must be admitted that the Cabañal does not disclose it’s secrets readily, it needs perseverence and patience to discover the side beyond that of a normal residential suburbs, albeit a highly decorative one.

Libreria la Romana is a large, dark dungeon of second books and tumbling piles of magazines leaning against odd bits of object d’art and bric-a-tat. It’s to be found at C/ Escalante, 196, one of the narrow streets that runs off Pintor Ferandis, but don’t expect to see a sign above the door. It’s looks like a tatty old shop that’s been closed for years, and even now is only open for business on Saturdays between 10 and 2 – at least it is if José Romano hasn’t gone off somewhere to watch a bullfight. The stock on the bending shelves is mainly Spanish, but José has an ‘International’ section; piles of assorted reading matter in English, French, Dutch and German in no apparent order or linguistic preference.

Just across the square in front of Libreria la Romana, the Plaza Dr Lorenzo de la Flor, is the Teatro de Marionets La Estrella, where, except for the summer months, puppeteer Gaby gives shows to school kids during the day and bigger adultish kids in the evenings.

For the last couple of decades the Poble Nou has been home to a thriving art’s community – although you’d never know by external appearances. Not usually known for their reticence as regards spublicity, the local artists prefer to work behind closed doors, only occassionally displaying themselves and their work in the odd temporary gallery or on restaurant walls. Newly opened in June of this year, Spai d’Art on Plaza Armada Españolas is the personal gallery of painter and sculptor Carmen Coret. For her first exhibition she presents a selection of elegant charcoal drawings and complex wooden structures, and, ever atuned to the frailties of an artist’s existance, also offers an interior design service.

In the rapidly-changing face of Valencia and the proposed extention through the Cabañal, it’s a joy to know that some thing’s don’t alter. On the unpretentios C/ José Benlliure, at number 69, Bodega Casa Montaña looks like a well-settled old bar that’s been on the go long before these upstarts with their fancy tilework arrived on the scene. And indeed it has.

Opened in 1836, its interior remains virtually unchanged since the day it started business. Huge ancient barrels line the side walls, while behind the marble-topped counter tall glass-fronted cabinets, the varnish cracked and blistered, display bottles of spirits and liquer. In a modest nod to modernity (at least it was in the 1960’s), high tubular steel stools encircle long slabs of marble, the communal dining tables.

If you look across the bar through a space between the barrels, you appear to be looking into a private dining room, with its round Victorian table and mirror-back sideboard covered with bottles. Just beyond you can vaguely make out the outline of an enormous room height barrel, and it’s in this room that Emiliano Garcia titilates the pallets of the most discerning wine buffs in the Valencian Community.

The wine list of Bodegas Montaña is actually a book, with over 1,500 different wines to choose from. Emiliano sees his role as owner as educational and holds regular tastings and talks on wine. Each month though, he holds a special carta where he brings together up to a dozen of the best wines currently available world-wide – and ladies are requested not to wear perfume. These events are non-profit making, he simply divides the total cost by forty, the maximum places available, and that’s the ticket price. And it’s not cheap, but even with ticket prices for his 2002 season ranging from a modest 52 euros for a sampling of a dozen ‘Magica Blanca’ to 160 euros for ‘Los Viñedos del Cielo’, or 130 euros for a taste of ten of the best champagnes, there are rarely spaces to be had on these special events. But don’t be put off from visiting Bodegas Montañas because it is renowned for it tapas and excellent selection of wines at ordinary prices.

If you intend to visit the Cabañal don’t leave it to long. The Ayuntamiento de Valencia is determined to drive the extention of the Avenida Blasco Ibañez through this priceless architectural gem, despite the vehement disapproval of the residents. Banners declaring ‘La prolongacio es illegal’, ‘No a la destruccío d’un Poble’ and ‘Rehabilitacion NOW!’ hang from balconies throughout the area. It seems incredible that at a time when other cities are saving and rejoicing in their architectural heritage and the Ayuntamient de Valencia is pouring millions into the Barrio del Carmen, they should be seeking to destroy what is recognised as one of the singularly most important areas of popular Modernista architecture in the whole of Spain. It can only be hoped that the staying power of the residents is strong enough to defeat the bulldozing mentality of the City Council.

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