Telefónica Building (Barcelona Telephone Exchange)

The skyscraper at the corner of Portal de l'Àngel rises as a stark, white limestone block, looming over the low-slung stone of the Gothic Quarter. When it opened in nineteen twenty-nine, its thirteen floors made it the tallest building in the city, an early experiment in American-style steel construction. During the Spanish Civil War, the building housed the central telephone exchange. George Orwell spent nights on its roof, watching searchlights sweep the sky while workers inside tapped lines to monitor political rivals below.