Antique Fairs and Antique Shops in Barcelona

These are my experiences of antiquing in Barcelona. There are two antique fairs that I visited on our holiday just last week in Barcelona:

The first antiques fair is: Encants Barcelona.

• 

The nearest metro station is Glories. We were there on Monday in the morning around 9.30am and it was bustling and busy.

The fair is huge, there are about three floors, but not all of them selling antiques. I saw some sells junk, really. The ground floor is the flea market one, with many stalls selling antiques. There are also some antique shops on the top floor which worth a visit. But you can decide quickly whether some stalls/shops selling antiques or not, so just skip those who are not.

We were there for around four hours as we were deeply interested to look into each antique stall and each antique shop, just so that we don’t miss anything.

We bought some antiques from this Encants fair. I bought two prayer / devotional books. One came from the antique shop at the top floor, run by lovely Spanish husband and wife. And the second came from the stall in the flea-market at the ground floor. I will post them soon here on my website.

My husband got several pieces of antiques. First he bought a lovely Spanish oil lamp silver from the top floor antique shop. And he also bought a Spanish silver cigarette case from a lovely stall in the ground floor run by a lovely Italian guy, and lastly he had a quite rare celluloid vesta with a painted gentlemen face (I found this for him in one of the flea-market ground floor stalls). 

The oil lamp silver is not big but it is heavy and it looks old (probably 19th centuty). The ciggarate case is probably 1940s. They both are Spanish silver, which is special, and they are reasonably priced. 

The celluloid vesta from the flea market ground floor is cheap, the lady only asked for €10, and we said disconto, and she gave it for €8. It is good in this market, we can bargain the price.

I think we looked at every single antique stalls – of course we skip the junk / non-antique one.

It is quite fun really looking at every antique stall in every single corner. If you are tired, on the top floor there are food stalls. I had an Asian/fried rice food and an ice tea for €7, not bad!

I would say definitely there is something for everyone. You can get something that you love for a bargain price. I would also say though that, in general, the quality of the antiques is so-so, in comparison to antique shops that sell more quality antiques, but then again the price reflects this.

If you know what you are looking for, then this is probably the place to hunt some bargains.

The second antiques fair that we go to is the Fira de Nautumismo in the Gothic quarter. The exact place is on a pretty square called Placa Reial.

Probably it is a kind of Numismatic fair because the stalls mainly sell coins.

We were there on Sunday morning around 10am. I think the fair runs every Sunday morning. 

There are approximately 40 stalls, many of them selling coins. My husband bought a Spanish coin for only €10 and an Italian coin for around €13.

I fortunately found a stall sellings brooches/pendants. I then had these lovely three brooch/pendants. Please see here for more.

We also went to the Gothic quarter and saw two antique shops:

The first one is Olga de Sandoval Antiquitats. This is a lovely shop with high quality antiques. You will find her shop filled with outstanding quality, hence the prices are not cheap too! The second antique shop which is worth a visit is Antique Aquiles. This is also a quality antique shop and the owner is very knowledgeable and eager to explain every item that we asked. I had an admiration of some of his pendants, but they are out of my budget! One pendant is of ivory and is painted, the other pendant is of gold and rubies. 

There is also an antique bookshop that we visited in the Gothic quarter.

The books are mostly in Spanish, so it is good to visit if you know what book you are looking for.

We also visited Bullevard del Antiquaris in Passeig De Gracia. There are around 20 shops that open when we visited them. All of good quality antiques, but the price is high too. If you are into high quality, old Spanish antiques, this is the place to visit!

I hope you enjoy the antiquing experience in Barcelona. And please comment below if you have any question?